-1- - 





LUTHER AFFIXES HIS NINETY-FIVE PROPOSITIONS TO THE CHURCH DOOR. 



THE LIFE 



OP 



MARTIN LUTHER, 

AND THE 

REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 

WITH AN 

INTRODUCTION 

BY THE 

REV. THEOPHILUS STORK, D.D., 

AUTHOR OP "THE CHILDREN OP THE NEW TESTAMENT." 



PHILADELPHIA: 
LINDSAY & BLAKISTON. 
18 5 8. 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by 

LINDSAY & BLAKISTON, 

in the Clerk's Office ot the District Court of the United States for the 
Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 

STEREOTYPED BY J. FAGAN. • PRINTED BY C. SHERMAN. 



£$?S«Tbomas L.Oasey 
Mar. 19, 1929 



CONTENTS. 



INTRODUCTION— By the Rev. Theophilus Stork, D. D Page 9 



PART FIRST. 



CHAPTER I. 

Luth^'s Birth 25 

Luther at School . . . 26 

, Luther sings as a Chorister at the door of Mistress Ursula Cotta, 27 

CHAPTER II. 

Luther discovers the Latin Bible in the University Library at 

Erfurt 28 

Luther's Friend Alexis is killed by Lightning — Luther over- 
taken BY A TERRIBLE THUNDERSTORM 29 

Luther enters the Monastery of the Augustines 30 

Luther is solemnly ordained a Priest 31 

CHAPTER III. 

Luther's bodily and mental Self-torments 32 

Luther fainting in his cell ; is revived by means of Music 33 

(iii) 



iv 



CONTENTS. 



Page 

Luther, mentally and corporeally exhausted, is strengthened by 

the consoling exhortations of an old monk 34 

Luther, as Bachelor of Arts, Lectures on Philosophy and Divi- 

NITY 36 

Luther preaches in the Monastery before Staupitz and the other 
Brethren, preparatory to Preaching in the Palace and 
Town Churches 37 

CHAPTER IV. 

Luther's Journey to Home 38 

Luther is with great solemnities created and consecrated Doctor 

of Divinity and Teacher of the holy Scriptures 40 

Luther occupied with the Duties of Vicar-General of the Augus- 

tines, which had been intrusted to him by Staupitz 41 

Luther affixes his Ninety-five Propositions to the Church-door 43 

Luther before Cajetan , 44 

Luther's Disputation with Dr. Eck at Leipzic 45 

CHAPTER V. 

Luther burns the Papal Bull 46 

Luther's Reception at "Worms 47 

Luther prepares himself by prayer for his appearance before the 

Emperor and Empire 48 

CHAPTER VI. 

Luther before the Emperor and the Empire 50 

Luther carried off by his Friends on his Return 51 

Luther begins his Translation of the Bible at Wartburg 52 

Luther's Departure on horseback from the Wartburg 53 

Luther and the Swiss Students in the Inn called the Black Bear 53 
Luther in the circle of his Wittenberg Friends is recognised by 

the Swiss Students 54 

Luther checks the Destruction of the Images of Saints 55 

» 



CONTENTS. T 



CHAPTER VII. 

Page 

Luther coxtixues his Traxslatiox of the Bible with the assist- 
ance or Melaxchthox 56 

Luther preaches at Seeburg agaixst the Peasants' "War 57 

Luther's Coxtroversy with Zwixgle ox the Sacramext 61 

CHAPTER VIII. ' 

Luther presexts the Augsburg Coxfessiox 63 

Luther's Traxslatiox of the Bible 65 

Luther ixtroduces the Catechism ixto the Schools 66 

Luther Preachixg 68 

Luther ox the Sacramext 69 

Luther reads the Bible to the Elector Johx the Coxstaxt 70 

Luther ox a Sick-bed, is visited axd comforted by the Elector 

Johx-Frederick 72 

CHAPTER IX. 

Luther at the Sick-bed of Melaxchthox 73 

Luther's Sixgixg at Home. Ixtroductiox of the Germax Church 

Hymxs axd Chaxts 75 

Luther's Joys of Summer ix the bosom of his Family, axd his ordi- 
nary Dinxer-guests 76 

Luther's Wixter Pleasures 78 

Luther beside the Coffix of his Daughter Magdalex 79 

CHAPTER X. 

Luther axd Haxs Kohlhase 81 

Luther durixg the Plague 82 

Luther's Last Journey ; his imposing Receptiox at Maxsfield ... 84 

Luther's Obsequies ." 86 



vi 



CONTENTS. 



PART SECOND. 



Page 



The Preparation for War 104 

The Reformation before Luther 105 

The Reformation in Luther 144 

The Struggle with Rome 181 

The Rupture 210 

Sprit %>Mt\. 

The Reformation and Revolution 232 

The Reformer and his Work 286 

Luther the Founder of a New Church 288 

Luther's Hymn and Translation 313 

Luther's Domestic Life and Friendships 333 

Retrospect and Conclusion 350 



LIST 

OP 

ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Luther affixes his Ninety -five Propositions to the 

Church-door, Frontispiece. 

Luther sings as a Chorister at the door of Mistress Ursula Cotta 

at Eisenach Page 27 

Luther enters the Monastery of the Augustines, 1505 30 

Luther is with great solemnities created and consecrated Doctor 

of Divinity and Teacher of the Holy Scriptures 40 

Luther's Marriage 59 

Luther reads the Bible to the Elector John the Constant 70 

Luther's Joys of Summer in the bosom of his Family 76 

(Tii) 



viii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Page 

Luther's Winter Pleasures , 78 

Luther's Obsequies 86 

Luther's Introduction of the Catechism into the Schools 89 

Luther discovers the Latin Bible in the University Library at 

Erfurt 148 

Luther before Cajetan , 188 

Luther burns the Papal Bull 210 

Luther before the Emperor and the Empire, 1521 225 

Luther continues his Translation of the Bible tfith the assist- 
ance of Melanchthon, 1523-4 286 

Luther Singing at Home — Introduction of the German Church 

Hymns and Chants 313 



INTRODUCTION. 



No man, since Apostolic times, has filled a larger sphere of 
human thought, than Martix Luther; and few, if any, bene- 
factors have stronger claims on the gratitude of mankind. 

As a great man and Reformer, it is not strange that both 
he and his work should be the subject of misapprehension, and 
sometimes of invidious detraction. It is no easy thing to take 
the measurement of great men. The pyramid may be mea- 
sured by geometric rule, and its colossal form transferred, with 
the nicest precision, to the canvass; "nay, Mont-Blanc is em- 
bossed in coloured stucco, and we have his very type and 
miniature fac-simile in our museums. But, for great men — 
how pale, thin, ineffectual, do the great figures we would sum- 
mon from History, rise before us ! Scarcely as palpable men, 
does our utmost effort body them forth : oftenest only, like 
Ossian's ghosts, in hazy twilight, with stars dim twinkling 
through their forms. Our Socrates, our Luther, after all that 
we have talked and argued of them, are to most of us quite 
invisible : the Sage of Athens, the Monk of Eisleben — not 
Persons, but Titles. Yet such men,' far more than any Alps 
or Coliseums, are the true world-wonders which it concerns us 
to behold clearly, and imprint for ever on our remembrance. 
Great men are the fire-pillars in this dark pilgrimage of man- 
1 (1) 



2 



INTRODUCTION. 



kind : they stand as heavenly signs — ever-living witnesses of 
what has been, prophetic tokens of what may still be. . . How 
many weighty reasons, how many innocent allurements, attract 
our curiosity to such men ! We would know them, see them 
visibly, even as we know and see our like : no hint, no notice, 
that concerns them, is superfluous or too small for us." * 

Hence, we welcome every well-executed effort to give us a 
more distinct and vivid conception of a great man. The work 
before us is of this description. It is the Life of Dr. Martin 
Luther, the German Reformer, in pictorial representations 
and historical sketches. It is the grateful tribute of genius, 
scholarship, and art, to the memory of the greatest man and 
work of modern Christianity. And we are free to affirm the 
conviction, that there is no similar work in the English lan- 
guage, which gives a more life-like and impressive view of the 
great Reformer, or a more philosophical and comprehensive 
idea of the Reformation as first evolved in the inner experience 
and spiritual struggles of Luther, and subsequently developed 
into the permanent form of a New Church. 

The appearance of such a work, in its present attractive 
form, must be matter of heartfelt satisfaction to every Chris- 
tian and Protestant. " For a well-written life is almost as 
rare as a well-spent one ; and there are certainly many more 
men whose history deserves to be recorded, than persons will- 
ing and able to furnish the record. No sooner does a great 
man depart, and leave his character as public property, than 
a crowd of little men rushes towards it. There they are 
gathered together, blinking up to it with such vision as they 



* Critical and Miscellaneous Essays, by Thomas Carlyle. Philadelphia, 
1845, p. 226. 



INTRODUCTION. 



3 



have, scanning it from afar, hovering round it this way and 
that, each cunningly endeavouring, by all arts, to catch some 
reflex of it, in the little mirror of himself; though, many times, 
this mirror is so twisted with convexities and concavities, and, 
indeed, so extremely small in size, that to expect any true 
image, or any image whatever, from it, is out of the question."* 
Luther, like other great men, has been thus blinked at by 
little men, whose souls were too diminutive to catch the reflec- 
tion of the whole man. What a distinguished critic says of 
Polonius, in relation to Hamlet, might be said substantially of 
some of the critics and biographers of Luther. It takes a 
whole man to know such a being as Hamlet, and Polonius is 
but the attic story of a man ! Of course, he cannot find a 
heart or a soul in Hamlet, because he has none himself to find 
them with. Now, some of these attic-story men, writing about 
Luther, manifest as much incompetency to understand the Re- 
former, as the gross and material Polonius to conceive of the 
etherial Hamlet. That there have been such biographers of 
Luther, no one will deny. It is reported, that Dr. Johnson, 
when he heard of Boswell's intention to write a life of him, 
said, if he were certified Boswell really meant to write his life, 
he would prevent it by taking BoswelVs I We dare not pre- 
sume that Luther would have thought of such an expedient 
against bad biographers, but he would certainly have blushed 
to see the reflection of himself from some of these little mir- 
rors, "so twisted with convexities and concavities." 

Some distinguished doctor undertook to assert, at a religious 
anniversary some years ago, that the Reformation was only an 
outward work, and intimated, that Luther himself was not the 



* Carlyle's Miscellaneous Writings. Phil., 1845, p. 7. 



4 



INTRODUCTION. 



subject of a spiritual regeneration. I explain the moral phe- 
nomenon of such sentiments by a reference to the Shaksperian 
critic just referred to. The said doctor could not understand 
Luther, for pretty much the same reason that Polonius could 
not conceive of such a spiritual being as Hamlet. 

To pretend a vindication of Luther from the cant prejudices 
of the ignorant, or the stolid criticisms of inflated sciolists, 
would be a bootless task ; for against stupidity, as has often 
been said, the gods themselves are powerless. 

But there are passages in some of Hallam's works which 
speak disparagingly of the genius and intellectual greatness 
of Luther, and which, from the peculiar position and reputation 
of the author, demand a passing notice. No modern writer 
has done such marked injustice to the genius of Luther as 
Hallam. He says, Luther's amazing influence on the revolu- 
tions of his own age, and on the opinions of mankind, seems to 
have produced, as is not unnatural, an exaggerated notion of 
his intellectual greatness.* From this, and similar expres- 
sions of opinion in other places, we infer, that Luther, in the 
estimate of Hallam, was rather a diminutive man, of little 
genius, and no literature, save theological. If Hallam had 

been a mere critic, such shallowness might be overlooked ; but 
* 

in a professed philosophical historian, such a conception of the 
great Reformer is unpardonable. It is obvious, he did not 
understand Luther. He confessedly bases his judgment of 
Luther on his writings, and yet, from his own admission, was 
unable to read him in his native German. " This alone," says 
Prof. Stowe, " renders him incapable of judging intelligently 
respecting his merits as a writer ; and knowing nothing, it 



* Introduction to the Literature of Europe, vol. i. p. 513. 



INTRODUCTION. 



5 



would have been honourable in him to say nothing, at least, 
nothing disparagingly. And, by the way, it seems to us that 
writing a history of European Literature, without a knowledge 
of German, is much like writing a history of metals, without 
knowing any thing of iron and steel."* 

Rogers f has, no doubt, given the true solution of this sin- 
gular judgment of Hallam. It arose from contemplating Lu- 
ther's character too exclusively in the point of view suggested 
by the literary nature of the work on which the critic was at 
the time engaged. "It is true that the Reformer's mind did 
not belong exclusively, or even prevailingly, to either of the 
two principal types with which we more usually associate 
genius, and which almost divide the page of literary history 
between them. The one is, the prevailingly philosophical 
temperament, with numberless specific differences; the other, 
the prevailingly poetic, with differences equally numerous : 
the passion of the one class of minds is speculative and scien- 
tific truth ; that of the other, ideal beauty. Yet there is an- 
other, and not less imposing form of human genius, though it 
does not figure much on the page of literary history, which has 
made men as illustrious as man was ever made, either by depth 
or subtlety of speculation — by opulence or brilliancy of fancy. 
This class of minds unite some of the rarest endowments of the 
philosophical and poetical temperaments ; and, though the rea- 
son in such men is not such as would have made an Aristotle, 
nor the imagination such as would have made a Homer, these 
elements are mingled in such proportions and combinations as 
render the product — the tertium quid — not less wonderful 



* See Bib. Repos., April, 1844. 

f Reason and Faith, and other Miscellanies, p. 94. 



6 



INTRODUCTION. 



than the greatest expansion of either element alone. To these 
are superadded some qualities which neither bard nor philoso- 
pher ever possessed, and the whole is subjected to the action 
of an energetic will and powerful passions. Such are the minds 
which are destined to change the face of the world, to originate 
or control great revolutions, to govern the actions of men by a 
sagacious calculation of motives, or to govern their thoughts by 

the magical power of their eloquence It is precisely to 

such an order of genius — whatever his merits or defects as a 
writer — that the intellect of Luther is, in our judgment, to be 
referred ; and, considered in this point of view, we doubt 
whether it is very possible to exaggerate its greatness. In a 
sagacious and comprehensive survey of the peculiarities of his 
position, in all the rapid changes of his most eventful history ; 
in penetrating the characters and detecting the motives of those 
with whom he had to deal ; in fertility of expedients ; in promp- 
titude of judgment and of action : in nicely calculating the 
effect of bold measures, especially in great emergencies — as 
when he burnt the papal bull, and appeared at the Diet of 
Worms ; in selecting the arguments likely to prevail with the 
mass of men, and in that contagious enthusiasm of character 
which imbues and inspires them with a spirit like its own, and 
fills them with boundless confidence in its leadership ; — in all 
these respects, Luther does not appear to us far behind any 
of those who have played illustrious parts in this world's affairs, 
or obtained an empire over the minds of their species. And 
surely this is sufficient for one man. No one ever denies the 
intellect of Pericles or Alexander, Cromwell or Napoleon, to 
be of the highest order, merely because none of them have left 
ingenious treatises of philosophy, or exquisite strains of poetry, 
or exhibited any of the traces either of a calm or beautiful 



INTRODUCTION. 



7 



intellect; and, in like manner, it is enough for Luther to be 
known as the author of the Reformation." 

This we regard as a satisfactory explanation of Hallam's 
singular disparagement of Luther, and gives us at the same 
time the true stand-point from which to estimate his greatness. 
It has been said that there are but two things worth living for : 
to do what is worthy of being written, or to write what is 
worthy of being read. It is true ; and we maintain that the 
greater of the two is the doing. Sir Walter Scott, somewhere, 
says that action is greater than writing. To be is greater than 
to describe. According to this principle, Luther performed a 
work greater, sublimer, than any work of genius. He was 
greater than, as mere artist or author, was Homer or Shak- 
speare, Phidius or Raphael : he was the original of what they 
were but copyists. He performed noble deeds, which are but 
noble thoughts actualized. Upon this principle, Coleridge says, 
" He was a Poet, indeed, as great a poet as ever lived in any 
age or country ; but his poetic images were so vivid, that they 
mastered the Poet's own mind. He was possessed with them, 
as with substances distinct from himself : Luther did not write, 
he acted Poems." Carlyle, in his article on "Luther's Psalm," 
says, "With words he had not learned to make pure music: it 
was by deeds of Love, or heroic valor, that he spoke freely. . . 
Nevertheless, though in imperfect articulation, the same voice, 
if we listen well, is to be heard in his Poems. The following,* 
for example, jars upon our ears ; yet is there something in it 
like the sound of Alpine avalanches, or the first murmur of 
earthquakes — in the very vastness of which dissonance a 
higher unison is revealed to us."| 

But, apart from his work, even in a purely literary point of 



* "Ein fester Burg ist unser Gott." f Carlyle's Misc., p. 224. 



8 



INTRODUCTION. 



view, Hallam has done Luther great injustice. A mere glance 
at his voluminous writings — the rapidity of their production — 
most of them composed, pro re natd, under the pressure of 
overwhelming engagements, — would make any man, with less 
temerity than Hallam, falter, in giving utterance to such sen- 
timents of disparagement as are found in his works. 

The dullest mind cannot but He struck with the versatility 
and comprehensiveness of Luther's genius, as displayed in his 
writings, embracing all subjects — theology, history, politics, 
education, literature, poetry, and music ; whilst in every de- 
partment he seems almost equally at home, and his views are 
expressed at times with peculiar eloquence and power ; and, 
indeed, on every topic, 'his thoughts are original, and sketched 
with a masterly hand. Prof. Stowe gives a sketch of his pro- 
ductions, in chronological order, which makes one stare with a 
look of incredulity. " From 1517 to 1526, the first ten years 
of the Reformation, the number of his publications was 300 ; 
from 1527 to 1536, the second decade, the number was 232 ; 
and from 1537 to 1546, the year of his death, the number was 
183. His first book was published in November, 1517, and 
he died in February, 1546, an interval of twenty -nine years 
and four months. In this time, he published 715 volumes, an 
average of more than twenty-five a year, or one a fortnight 
for every fortnight of his public life. . . . He continued his 
^labours to the very last. The six weeks, immediately preceding 
his death, he issued thirty-one publications from the press, an 
average of more than five a week. The complete catalogue of 
all his works, Latin and German, comprises twenty-four large 
folio pages, closely printed, in double columns, in the Appendix 
to Seckendorf." 

It seems almost unnecessary to attempt any further refuta- 



INTRODUCTION. 



9 



tion of Hallam's estimate of the great Reformer. But as 
"braggart Papists and puling Puseyites," and pseudo Protest- 
ants, have re-echoed this disparagement, it may not be wholly 
irrelevant to adduce testimonials from distinguished Romanists, 
as well as Protestants, expressive of their high estimation of 
Luther as a man of genius and learning. And first, let us 
hear what Romanists have said of Luther. 

The French Jesuit Maimbourg, of the seventeenth century, 
a violent enemy of Protestantism, says, " He (Luther) possessed 
a quick and penetrating genius. He acquired great knowledge 
of the languages and the fathers,"* &c. 

Varillas, the ecclesiastical historian, says, " Nobody exceeded 
him in philosophy and scholastic theology — nobody equalled 
him in the art of speaking. He was a most perfect master of 
eloquence. 

Audin, a Jesuit historian, says, "Luther holds a glorious 
place in German literature. . . . Luther was the great preacher 
of the Reformation. He possessed almost all the qualities of 
an orator : an exhaustless store of thought, an imagination as 
ready to receive as to convey its impressions, and an incon- 
ceivable fluency and suppleness of style. . . . He was at once 
Rabelais and Fontaine — with the droll humour of the one and 
the polished elegance of the other, "f 

Frederick Schlegel, confessedly one of the greatest men of 
his age, and a strict Romanist, says, "As to the intellectual 
power and greatness of Luther, abstracted from all considera- 
tions of the uses to which he applied them, I think there are 
few, even of his own disciples, who appreciate him highly 
enough." Concerning Luther as an orator, he says, "Luther 
displays a most original eloquence, surpassed by few names 



* His. du Lutheranisme, Paris, 1080. f Audin's Life of Luther. 



10 



INTRODUCTION. 



that occur in the whole history of literature. He had, indeed, all 
those properties which render a man fit to be a revolutionary 
orator." Upon this passage of Schlegel, concerning Luther 
as an orator, Rogers* remarks, " If this be so, the intellect of 
Luther must be regarded as one of the rarest phenomena, 
which appear in the world of mind. Such, at least, has been 
hitherto the uniform judgment of criticism. To possess a 
genius for consummate eloquence is always considered to imply 

intellectual excellence of the highest order So peculiar 

are the required modifications and combinations of intellect, 
imagination, and passion, that it may be pretty safely averred, 
we shall as soon see the reproduction of an Aristotle as of a 
Demosthenes." 

From the eulogistic tone and enthusiasm of these sentiments, 
we might take them for the outgushing admiration of grateful 
Protestants ; but a reference to the authors will show, that, 
with the exception, perhaps, of Schlegel, they were Luther's 
bitterest enemies. They were the reluctant testimonials of 
Romanists to the genius and greatness of Luther — testimo- 
nials that were the natural and inevitable expressions of their 
deep and honest conviction. 

We must be allowed a few isolated extracts from Protestants, 
expressing the same sentiments concerning Luther. 

Prof. Stowe, of Andover, says, " There was, probably, never 
created a more powerful human being, a more gigantic, full- 
proportioned Man, in the highest sense of the term, than Mar- 
tin Luther. In him, all that belongs to human nature, all that 
goes to constitute a Man, had a strongly marked and charac- 
teristic development. He was a model-man, one that might 
be shown to other beings, in other parts of the universe, 



* Reason and Faith, and other Miscellanies. 



INTRODUCTION. 



11 



aw a specimen of collective manhood in its maturest growth."* 
Similar, in sentiment and expression, is the quaint representa- 
tion of the Reformer by Carlyle — " 1 will call this Luther a 
true great Man ; great in intellect, in courage, affection, and 
integrity ; one of our most loveable and precious men. Great, 
not as a hewn obelisk, but as an Alpine mountain — so simple, 
honest, spontaneous, not setting up to be great at all; there 
for quite another purpose than being great ! Ah yes, unsub- 
duable granite, piercing far and wide into the heavens ; yet, in 
the clefts of it, fountains, green beautiful valleys, with flowers ! 
A right spiritual Hero and Prophet : once more a true son of 
Nature and Fact, for whom these centuries, and many to 
come yet, will be thankful to Heaven. "f 

Coleridge, whose judgment, on what constitutes the elements 
of true greatness and the heroical attributes of Human Nature, 
few will be disposed to question, says — " He is, of all men, 
the one whom I especially love and admire. ... It is singular, 
how all men have agreed in assigning to Luther the heroic 
character, and indeed it is certainly most just." 

We regard it as useless to enlarge further upon this point. 
We are satisfied to leave the almost isolated detraction of 
Luther's genius by Hallam beside the noble counter-testimo- 
nials just furnished. They might be amplified to almost any 
extent, from the most distinguished writers since the Reforma- 
tion, but it would seem a work of supererogation, as the senti- 
ments already adduced express the almost universal conviction 
of mankind concerning 

" The solitary Monk, that shook the world." 

That Luther had faults, no one pretends to deny, not even 
his most enthusiastic admirers. And his faults may seem 



* Bib. Rep, April, 1844. 



f Heroes and Here Worship. 



12 



INTRODUCTION". 



greater than other men's for the very reason that 
greater than other men : as the towering mountain 
wider shadow than the little hillock. 



casts a 



he was 



" Luther had faults ! but, oh ! ye little minds, 
Less in your faith, and lesser still in deeds 

Which make the hero, 

While the outer life 



Ye ponder, have ye pierced the core within? 
A fool can censure where a prophet weeps, 
When life is only by its faults and falls 
Review'd ; — but underneath, what noble tears, 
What pangs remorseful, penitence, and prayer, 
What struggles mute, what passionate regrets I 
Deep in the bosom — there begins the fight ! 
And there the battle-scene 'tween Flesh and Faith 
Unfolds its grandeur. All without appears 
The moral echo of that inward din, — 
The mere reflection of internal strife, 
In fitful shadows, thrown on human eyes."* 

Lessing seems to have rejoiced in discovering defects in 
Luther — "for," says he, "I have, in fact, been in imminent 
danger of making him an object of idolatrous veneration. The 
proofs, that in some things he was like other men, are to me 
as precious as the most dazzling of his virtues." 

To those mean and carping spirits that are ever croaking 
over Luther's imperfections, whilst they overlook his abound- 
ing excellencies. I would simply apply the remarks of Coleridge 
concerning those who complained of the incidental evils of the 
Reformation. " It argues a narrow and corrupt nature to lose 
the general and lasting consequences of rare and virtuous en- 
ergy in the brief accidents which accompanied its first move- 
ments — to set lightly by the emancipation of the human reason 
from a legion of devils, in our complaints and lamentations 
over the loss of a herd of swine. 



* Luther ; or, Rome and the Reformation, by Rob. Montgomery. 



INTRODUCTION. 



13 



Our object, however, is not to discuss Luther and the Refor- 
mation, but to introduce the reader to this new work, in which 
both are presented in a novel and attractive form. 

The present work is a translation from the German work 
entitled — " Dr. Martin Luther, der Deutsche Reform ator. In 
bildlichen Darstellungen, von Gustav Konig. In geschicht- 
lichen Umrissen, von Heinrich Gelzer. Hamburg, 1851." 

It is a beautiful conception, happily actualized in this work, 
of interweaving the life of Luther with the Reformation, and 
thus fusing the one into the other — giving a historical and 
moral unity and identity to the man and his work. Nor is it 
a mere ideal of the fancy, but a real picture. " The progress 
of the Reformation in Luther's own mind ; a very curious sub- 
ject. Such were the great talents and qualities of Luther, and 
such the situation of Europe at the time, that the Reformation, 
in fact, passed from the mind of the one into the mind of the 
other."' 1 ' And, as Montgomery justly says, "Luther the Re- 
former is, after all, but an outward and visible index to the 
inward and invisible characteristics of Luther the Man ; and 
if, in the open light of history, we are struck with the almost 
miraculous consequences a lonely monk, from the depths of an 
Augustinian convent, put in motion — not less are we affected 
to perceive how wonderfully and wisely the trials and experi- 
ences of his inner nature were providentially overruled, and 
wrought into experimental connexion with those religious 
achievements which have rendered the name of Martin Luther 
immortal, "f 

An abstract. from the Preface of the original work will sub- 
stantially indicate the nature and object of the same work in its 

* Prof. Smyth's Lectures on Modern History. 

f Luther ; or, Rome and the Reformation, Biog. Preface to first ed. 



14 



INTRODUCTION. 



present American form. " The elegant drawings, from -which the 
artistic engravings of the original work were made, created a 
great sensation, at Munich, a few years ago : they found so 
many and such ardent admirers, that it was resolved to publish 
them, together with a biography of Luther. Gelzer undertook 
the latter portion of the work. His object was, he says, to 
present to his countrymen a book which should renew, in fresh 
outlines, the image of their great intellectual hero — a book 
which a father might read to his domestic circle — which mio;ht 
accompany the young student to his high-school — and which 
might furnish a subject for reflection to the clergyman, whether 
in the quiet of his native land, or in a new home, in distant 
colonies, on the other side of the ocean, reminding him, in the 
latter case, of the land of his fathers, the historical home of 
his spiritual life and of his faith."* 

The second part of the work, giving an outline of the Refor- 
mation, is thus defined by Gelzer — " It is not our intention 
to arid one more to the many biographies of our great man, 
and to repeat all that has been already related so many times, 
so thoroughly and minutely. Our principal endeavor is, rather 
to work out the rich abundance of historical facts, and to arrange 
them in large, easily comprehended groups, so that the true 
essential importance of the Reformer and of his ivork, for his 
times and for our own, may be depicted in them to the life." "j" 

In the first part, we have the Life of Luther in pictorial and 
des-criptive representations. The minor details, that are com- 
mon to every human life, are omitted : assuming that the boy 
Martin went through the usual process of crying and fretting 
and pouting, " of being fondled and flattered and flogged ; and 
that the sun and stars and silent sky shed in their soft, sweet 



* Preface to London edition. 



f Gelzer, London edition, p. 65. 



INTRODUCTION. 15 

influences upon his childhood, for similar things we know hap- 
pen to most of us, though not indeed with similar results."* 

He is sent to school, but no marvellous freaks and eccentrici- 
ties are related of the boy, which were found long afterwards, 
to foreshadow the greatness of the man. We read neither of 
his climbing trees, like Schiller, to see where the lightning 
came from — nor of his running away from school, like Bar- 
row, to escape from study. He tells us, indeed, of his being 
whipped fifteen times in one morning, and leaves us now, if we 
choose, to see in that something prophetic of his future great- 
ness, as a man whose words were battles. Meanwhile, as some 
one says of Shakspeare, the boy grew both inwardly and out- 
wardly ; how much he grew outwardly was apparent to those 
about him ; how much he must have grown inwardly is, or at 
least ought to be, apparent to us. 

In the present American edition, the beautiful artistic illus- 
trations are dispersed throughout the entire work — so that the 
great historical facts and scenes in the life of Luther, and the 
grand epochs in the Reformation, pass consecutively before 
the eye of the reader, and are vividly repictured to the soul, 
and reim pressed upon the heart. The first in the series repre- 
sents the youthful Martin, and his companions, at the door of 
Madame Cotta, in Eisenach. He is there as a poor boy, sing- 
ing for his daily bread. This bread-music, as he afterwards 
called it, and the gentle sympathy and timely beneficence of 
Madame Cotta, no doubt, awakened feelings that were profitably 
recalled in the darker scenes of his afterlife. Bosomed in that 
home of art, music, and love, the budding energies of his mind 
unfolded in blossoms of expanding force and freshness. Oft, 
amid the storms of life, did he love 



* Hudson 



16 



INTRODUCTION. 



" That sabbath-haven of the soul to haunt 
With mem'ry's eye : and once again recall 
The bliss of tranquil being." . . . 

Never could he forget that •womanly kindness and sympathy — 
that home of his friendless youth — never ! 

" When years had flown, and Europe's grateful hand 
Round Luther's name a wreath of glory twined, 
And at his feet the heart of empires bow'd 
Admiring, Cotta's home, still unforgot, 
Was outlined in his mindful heart of love 
Serene as ever ; while his voice proclaim'd, 
By gallantry and grace at once inspired, — 
There's nothing lovelier than a woman's soul, 
When Truth divine erects her temple there ! " * 

Without attempting even a passing allusion to all the pic- 
tures that beautify and illustrate this volume, we cannot omit 
a reference to some of the more striking. 

Luther in the Library of the University of Erfurt. The 
artist depicts the inquiring youth, gazing intently i pon the 
open Bible, absorbed in the history of Samuel and his mother, 
'• having cast aside the schoolmen, and their misunderstood 
chief, Aristotle." 

" That moment was the Reformation's seed : 
That volume, then, the universe outweigh'd 
In mental preciousness, and moral power ! 
For, in its pages slept those living germs 
Of principle, from out whose depth have sprung 
The faith and freedom of a Christian world." f 

Luther burning the papal bull. How vividly that "scene, 
heroically great, and unsurpassed," flashes before us. Luther, 
condemned by the Pope, felt that the time had now come for 
an open rupture with Rome. He said to the Pope, " You are 
not God's vicegerent; you are another's, I think." "We see 



* Luther, by Montgomery. 



fib. 



INTRODUCTION. 



17 



Luther in the act of casting the decrees of the Pope and the 
bull of Leo X. into the devouring flames, while 

" The blaze 
Redden'd, and rose beside the eastern gate 
Of Wittenburg." 

"Wittenburg," says Carlyle, " looked on, with shouts — the 
whole world looked on. It was the shout of the awakening 

of the nations Luther had cast off for ever the spectral 

nightmare and triple-hatted chimera of Rome." 

LutJier before the Emperor and the Empire, 1521. There 
is something grand and imposing in this picture. It could not 
be otherwise, unless the artist had utterly failed to catch the 
spirit and moral sublimity of the scene. For it was the great- 
est in modern European history. " That was the most remark- 
able assembly ever convened on earth — an Empire against a 
man ! " He is before the most august assembly — 

"But, there He stands ! in superhuman calm, 
Concentr'd, and sublime, .... 
Crown'd with the grace of everlasting truth, 
A more than monarch, among kings he stood." 

The only regret felt in beholding this picture is, that the artist 
did not impersonate more of the spirit and majesty of the scene 
in the face and attitude of Luther. It is in our view, a great 
defect. We could not say of Luther here, what is said of him 
in another representation of the same scene. " Cranach's pic- 
ture represents Luther as he stood there — so lone and strong, 
with his great fire-heart — a new Prometheus, confronting the 
Jove of the sixteenth century and the German Olympus." 

Luther introducing the Catechism into the schools. We ad- 
vert to this here, because of its historical connexion with the 
Reformation, as among its "most beautiful fruits." The picture 
2 



18 



INTRODUCTION. 



is one of great artistic beauty, but becomes pre-eminently at- 
tractive from its mental contrasts and moral associations. The 
great Reformer is seen, in the midst of a number of children, 
expounding his Catechism, whilst Jonas is distributing the book 
among them. It is a beautiful sight ! He, who stormed 

" Round the vile Popedom, till its pillars shook, 
Sank to the level of a simple child, 
And won frail childhood to the creed he framed. 

. . . . While the hand which hurl'd 
The false Decretals to the devouring fire 
Plies o'er some little book, or teaching page, 
Where infancy may learn the name to lisp 
Of Jesus ; or, the budding mind unfold, 
In faith and freshness, to the call of heaven."* 

The artistic illustrations of Luther s domestic life give pe- 
culiar interest and attraction to this volume. 

Luther s marriage. There is something in this picture that 
touches the heart. There is a moral grandeur in that quiet 
scene of beauty. "By this step," says Gelzer, "he as deci- 
dedly opposed the Catholicism of the middle ages, as by burn- 
ing the papal bull." And this accounts for the clamors of the 
Romanists. "Nothing less than Antichrist," they said, "could 
be the fruit of the union of a monk and a nun." The taunt 
■well justified the caustic sarcasm of Erasmus : " That there 
must already have been many Antichrists, if that was the sole 
condition of their appearance." No one can look at this picture, 

" Where his devoted heart 
The wedded Luther to his Ketha gave," 

without being deeply impressed with the moral beauty and 
heavenly sanctity of marriage. 

We have two additional pictures, illustrative of Luther's 
home-life. The first presents Luther in his summer-joys, in 



* Luther — Poems, by R. Montgomery. 



INTRODUCTION". 



19 



the bosom of his family. It is an exquisite picture of a do- 
mestic garden-scene. A glance gives us some idea of the man 
"whose heart ever opened in the free air, in the sight and 
enjoyment of nature; who gladly observed and admired the 
creation, with his pious, thoughtful, and practical eye. Lu- 
ther had a pure and sanctified poetical feeling, with which he 
most beautifully invested even the commonest objects around 
him, and he ever drew from all the events of life loveliness 
and truth."* 

As a counterpart to this summer-scene, we have next, u Lu- 
ther s winter pleasures" Here we see Luther in the midst of 
the Christmas festival ; "and in the garden, which now delights 
his eyes, are his children, whom he looked upon as God's 
greatest blessing." 

The series of illustrations fitly closes with a most touching 
representation of Luther s obsequies. 

Without protracting these introductory remarks, we com- 
mend this memorial of Luther and the Reformation to the 
Protestant community. Altogether, it is the most beautiful 
tribute that has recently been paid to the memory and work 
of the great Reformer. " It is an offering of flowers and fruit 
on the altar of the greatest memory which the heart of modern 
Christianity enshrines. It is the whole history of Luther told 
in pictures, and descriptions of those pictures, followed by a 
connected sketch of the Reformation as it centered in him."f 

It is a book, says Gelzer, which cannot fail to renew, " in fresh 
outlines, the image of Luther, and depict the true essential 
importance of the Reformer and of his work, for his time and 



* Luther's Fireside, by E. B. Stork. 

f C. P. Krauth, Ev. Review, April, 1852. 



20 



INTRODUCTION. 



for our own." And yet, whilst it tends to exalt our conceptions 
of the genius and moral greatness of the Hero, it is so con- 
structed, in its representation of his work, as to impress us 
with the fact that, after all, Luther was but the instrument in 
the hands of God, for the accomplishment of his plans and 
purposes ; and with this recognition of the Divine hand, we 
exclaim, with Montgomery — 

" And thus, th' Almighty did Himself inspire 
The Reformation ; though unheard, unseen, 
And unimagined, in the midst He moved, 
While Luther was the mental Hand which made 
The outward Index of His secret will." 

The book is eminently adapted to our own age. "For," 
says Gelzer, "in this one point, at least, our times are brought 
into immediate contact with Luther : then, as now, the highest 
social and religious questions were brought forward for solu- 
tion ; then, as now, the most sacred rights of individuals and 
of nations were contended for ; and in the sixteenth, as in the 
nineteenth century, the die was cast, on which the future 
depended."* 

The book may possibly be of some service to those in our 
day, who, in their boast of Lutheranism, have so utterly for- 
gotten the very spirit of Luther and the Reformation. It may 
be well for those, who are ever vaunting their symbolic ortho- 
doxy, and conjuring the younger of our ministers to venerate 
the symbols of the church, to hear that noble outburst of Lu- 
ther, when they began to burn his works — "Let them destroy 
my works ; I desire nothing better ; for all I wanted was to 
lead Christians to the Bible, that they might afterwards throw 
away my writings. Great God ! if we had but a right under- 



* Gelzer, Reformation, p. 206. 



INTRODUCTION. 



21 



standing of the Holy Scriptures, what need would there be of 
my books ? " Dr. Cheever thus comments on this declaration 
of Luther : — 

" 0, how noble is this ! How characteristic of a soul that had drunk deep 
for its own self into the Bible, and would have every other soul go and 
plunge into the same fountain of blessedness, and drink, and continue to 
drink there, and there only. We love Luther for this noble declaration. 
And sure we are that his works, fresh and powerful as they are, and the 
works of every other uninspired man, .... when compared with God's 
word, are but as winking tapers in the light of a noon-day sun. And 
what should we think of the man who, if a set of gas-lights were hung up 
to burn in the streets at noon-day, should go about endeavouring to walk 
by their light, or perpetually calling upon you to admire their glory, 
while he scarcely seems aware that the sun above him, like the very face 
of God, is shining with such splendor as almost to put out those pale 
and ineffectual fires."* 

The same original thinker proceeds to say — 
" This being the case, on a comparison even of the richly spiritual 
divines of the seventeenth century with inspiration, how much more with, 
reference to the writers called the Christian Fathers, comprehending so 
wide and chaotic a gathering of spoils and opinions in what Milton calls 
the drag-net of antiquity. It would be difficult to depict the ineffable 
absurdity of sending back the Christians of this generation into the twi- 
light of Romish superstition and philosophy, to interpret Scripture by 
tradition from the Fathers. Often as we see this attempted exaltation 
of the early doctors of the church into the place of supremacy over our 
own faith and opinion as founded on the Scriptures, we think of Taylor's 
powerful and beautiful delineation of the contrast between those doctors 
after the time of Christ, and the Jewish prophets before him. 1 It must 
be acknowledged that the writers of the ancient dispensation were such 
as those should be, who were looking onward towards the bright day of 
gospel splendor; while the early Christian doctors were just such as 
one might well expect to find those, who were looking onward toward 
that deep night of superstition, which covered Europe during the middle 
ages. The dawn is seen to be gleaming upon the foreheads of the one 
class of writers, while a sullen gloom overshadows the brows of the 
other.' " 

Every one can see how much we need a revival of the spirit 
and vital doctrine of the Reformer — the very life and power 



* Bib. Rep., Jan., 1844. 



22 



INTRODUCTION. 



of the Reformation. There is everywhere the cry for a more 
churchly spirit — and much is spoken and written about sym- 
bolism and the historical development of the church, creeds, 
and sacraments, &c, whilst the grand, central doctrine of jus- 
tification by faith is well-nigh forgotten, or left to slumber 
beside exploded errors. There is a wonderful zeal to " bring 
up all the imposing outward show of the past — to take up the 
cast-off frippery of a past dispensation — to put on the rotten 
rags of Judaism, gilded with the cross, and idolizing, in the 
manhood of Christianity, the cradle and standing-stool of its 
infancy. These were the toys of an immature age, and to keep 
them up, under the bright light and bracing air of the gospel, 
is like a man keeping the whistles and sleds, the wooden 
swords and paper caps of his boyhood, to play w T ith in the 
gravity of fifty years."* 

When w T e see this sickening cant about tlie forms and out- 
ward observances of the church — this polemical strife about 
externals — this refined and gilded formalism — this exaltation 
of The Church, in the place of Christ — this effort to make 
Church-men, instead of Christ's-men — we feel that these vaunt- 
ing disciples of Luther know neither the spirit nor the work of 
the Reformation. " When we look at the discipline through 
which Luther and some other men passed, in their baptism with 
the fire of this doctrine (justification by faith), it seems that w r e 
do but dream about it, that we know nothing of it, that we are 
like men walking and talking in our sleep — a race of religious 
somnambulists." When we see this painful discrepancy be- 
tween the spiritual experience and struggles of Luther and the 
cold and lifeless ritualism of some in our day, who boast his 
name — we say, they neither understand Luther nor themselves 



* Cheever. 



INTRODUCTION. 



23 



They are ascending Pilate's staircase — "would to God that 
such a voice from heaven as thundered into Luther's soul might 
enter into every such man's soul ; but, even if it did, it would 
do no good, without something of Luther's deep spiritual expe- 
rience, gathered in conflict and prayer."* 

The energy and ability of the church are expended upon 
trivial questions, upon specious or speculative heresies in rela- 
tion to the symbols and sacraments, whilst it seems to be over- 
looked that the most dangerous heresy is that of the heart, found 
in Christ's own church — the want of a purer love, a simpler 
faith, and a more direct and holy zeal for the salvation of souls. 
There is no time to speculate and contend with brethren about 
the controversies of the day, whilst there is this solemn con- 
troversy of the Church with her God undecided. 

" No, brethren, it is not a fitting season for the Church to be com- 
pounding unguents for the freckled skin of a fancied, or, at most, a fri- 
volous heresy, while the plague of lukewarmness is sweeping her streets, 
and the bier of spiritual death is passing on its way, from door to door 
of her habitations. We have another and sterner quarrel to settle. The 
stain of blood — of the blood of souls, is on the floor of our deserted and 
untrodden closets — upon our pulpits — upon our communion-tables. 
It is, as the prophet of old witnessed, not found by secret search, but 
openly, and upon all these. And yet we feel it not, or acknowledging 
it, we do not aright apprehend, and repent of the evil of our ways."f 

" And sure we are, that if Luther were now on earth, to publish again 
this element of his power (justification by faith), with the freshness of 
his burning experience, to pour it from the depths of his full heart as 
from a church organ, accustomed as we are to think that we know all 
about it, it would stir Christendom now with almost as much enthusiasm, 
and with almost as great a convulsion, as it did then. "J 

But, as he cannot speak to us again, in those living tones 

of eloquence that once roused the nations, and quickened the 

slumbering church — we trust, that all who bear his name, 

may see the great Reformer, in his spiritual experience and 



* Cheever. f Miscellanies, by W. R. Williams, p. 107. X Cheever. 



24 



INTRODUCTION. 



inner struggles, his words and his works- — living before them, 
in this book — and catch his spirit, and imitate his example, 
so far as he breathed the spirit, and followed in the footsteps, 
of his Lord and our Lord ; and learn, at least, to respect 
those who, like Luther, exalt the Bible above all human au- 
thority, and, like him, seek to promote experimental piety, vital 
godliness, and genuine revivals of religion in the church ; re- 
membering that "the history of Protestantism, in its origin and 
early progress, is simply the history of an extensive and mighty 
revival of religion."* "May God, in mercy, baptize every 
one of us with this spirit. May the church possess it. May 
the spirit and power of justification by faith take hold upon us ! 
Then will the final conflict of the Gospel against Romanism, 
against Formalism, be a short conflict indeed; but a more 
glorious triumph of God's Word and Spirit than the world 
has ever witnessed. "f 

It is with unmingled satisfaction, we hail this new memorial 
of the immortal Luther, and from its inherent excellency and 
artistic beauty, predict for it an extensive circulation. The 
gratitude of the Protestant community is due to the publishers 
for presenting this admirable book to the American public, in 
a form so beautiful and attractive, and yet so cheap. We 
hope it will become a household book in every Protestant 
family, and grace the parlors of our land as a treasured gift- 
book of the Reformation. And in this home of freedom and 
the Bible — 

" Long 

May Luther's voice, and Luther's spirit, live 
Unsilenced and unsharaed.'' 

T. STORK. 

Philadelphia, July 25 tb, 1854. 



* Prof. Stowe, of Andover. 



f Cheever. 



MARTIN LUTHER, 

AND THE 

^formation in (Snmant}* 



PART FIRST. 

LIFE OF LUTHER. 



CHAPTER I. 

Martin Luther was born in Eisleben, the I Oth of 
November, 1483, and consecrated by prayer to the 
service of his Lord and Maker. 

Conrad Schliisselburg relates, that Luther's father 
had often prayed aloud and fervently, at the bedside 
of his child, that God would grant the boy grace, that 
he might — remembering his name, Luther, i. e. lender 
(pure) — forward the propagation of the pure doctrine. 
Supposing that this account, were unfounded or un- 
authenticated still, all that is known of the great 
Reformer's father assures us that the first emotion at 
the birth of his son was no other than the one here 
depicted. 



26 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



The child born on St. Martin's eve, and baptized on 
that saint's day, received his name ; " which baptismal 
name/' says Johann Mathesius, "he has maintained 
through life with Christian honour, as a valiant 
warrior and knight of Christ." 

LUTHER AT SCHOOL. 

Hans Luther took his son to the school at Mans- 
feld — the second step in that son's life. IC Hans Luther 
brought up his baptised little son creditably in the 
fear of God by the gains of his mining labours ; and 
when he came to years of discretion, sent him, with 
heart-felt prayer, to the Latin school, where the boy 
learnt quickly and industriously the ten command- 
ments, the child's creed, the Lord's prayer, also Dona- 
tus, the child's grammar, Cesio Janus, and psalm- 
singing." (Mathesius.) 

In this school, according to Luther's own account, 
he passed through a physical discipline of great 
severity. " In one morning," he says, " I was well 
whipt fifteen times." In his later years he still com- 
plains, "how in former times schools were mere 
prisons or hells, and school-masters tyrants and flagel- 
lators ; how the poor children were whipt indiscrimi- 
nately and unceasingly ; how they were made to learn 
with great labour and immoderate toil, but to little 




LUTHER SINGS AS A CHORISTER AT THE DOOR OF MISTRESS URSULA 
COTTA, AT EISENACH. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



27 



purpose. To such teachers and masters we were 
every where obliged to submit : they knew nothing 
themselves, and could teach us nothing good or useful." 



LUTHER SINGS AS A CHORISTER (CURRENDSCHULER *) AT 
THE DOOR OF MISTRESS URSULA COTTA AT EISENACH. 

We stand before the house of Mistress Cotta, where 
Luther sings as a poor scholar for his daily bread. 
" It is stated," he says, " and it is true, that the Pope 
himself has been a poor scholar ; therefore despise not 
those poor lads who cry at your door, Panem propter 
Deum ! and sing their song for their daily bread. I 

* The word currend is derived from the Latin currere, to run, and, 
with the addition of Schiiler (scholar,) is here applied to a company 
of boys found in those days in almost all considerable German towns, 
who walked (or ran) through the streets singing hymns. The prac- 
tice seems to have originated with the begging friars, who wandered 
about getting their living by alms. They were imitated by the 
Bacchantes, who sang at people's doors and received alms. After 
the Reformation they were formed into regular chorus-singers, who, 
like their prototypes, sang at the doors of the wealthier citizens, and 
were maintained from some charitable or church fund. The Trans- 
lator remembers such a band very well in her native city, traversing 
the streets on Sunday, Wednesday, and Saturday mornings, stopping 
at the doors of the clergymen and of some members of the magis- 
tracy, singing hymns appropriate to the days, on Sundays before the 
beginning of divine service. They were then admitted to the 
chapel royal, and joined in the choir. They wore curious old- 
fashioned hats and cloth cloaks, which were regularly provided for 
them. 



28 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

myself was once such a screaming boy, and have sought 
my bread at people's doors, particularly in my beloved 
city of Eisenach." 

Repulsed from several doors, and much depressed, 
he arrives at length with his choir before the hospita- 
ble dwelling of his future foster-mother, the good 
Mistress Cotta, " a devout matron, who gave him a 
place at her table, because she had conceived a warm 
affection for the boy, on account of his singing and 
his ardent prayer." In the house of this his fostering 
friend and comforter he became intimate with a higher 
comforter, music, that noble relief to his war-worn 
spirit. Here he learnt to play on several musical 
instruments. 



CHAPTER II. 

LUTHER DISCOVERS THE LATIN BIBLE IN THE UNIVERSITY 
LIBRARY AT ERFURT, 1501. 

But a yet higher study w r as opening before him than 
that of music, the Holy Scriptures, the revelation of 
God! In the library at Erfurt he found the book 
which w^as to become the foundation-stone of his fu- 
ture labours. Mathesius relates: "As he searches 
among the books in the university library, to make 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



himself acquainted with the good ones, he hits upon 
the Latin Bible, which he has never seen before. He 
observes with astonishment that this book contains 
many more texts, epistles, and gospels, than are 
usually explained in the homilies, or from the pulpits 
in churches. As he is turning over the Old Testa- 
ment, he meets with the history of Samuel and his 
mother Anna, which he reads hastily through with 
great joy and delight; he begins to wish from his 
whole heart that our good God would give him some 
day such a book to be his own." 

This was the first casual sight Luther ever had into 
that land which was to become his home. He says 
himself, " As a young man I saw a Bible in the uni- 
versity library at Erfurt, and read a portion of the 
first book of Samuel ; but I had to attend a lecture 
just then : willingly would I have read through the 
whole book, but had no opportunity." 

luther's friend alexis is killed by lightning — lu- 
ther overtaken by a terrible thunderstorm. 

Presentiments of death in frightful forms arise 
before the thoughtful mind of young Luther : a uni- 
versity friend (Alexis is said to have been his name) 
is suddenly killed ; a thunderstorm surprises and ter- 
rifies him during a solitary ramble. The two events 



30 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



mature in him the resolution to withdraw from the 
world, and devote himself entirely to God. 

When his good friend is killed, and a violent storm 
and fearful clap of thunder alarm him greatly, and he 
is filled with dread of the wrath of God and the last 
judgment, he resolves and makes a vow that he will 
enter a monastery, there to serve God and be recon- 
ciled unto him by the reading of masses ; also to at- 
tain his eternal salvation by monastic sanctit}^. " Help, 
Saint Anna !" he cried, when the lightning struck close 
beside him, " and I will forthwith become a monk !" 

LUTHER ENTERS THE MONASTERY OF THE AUGUSTINES, 1505. 

The vow is accomplished; Luther enters the monas- 
tery of the Augustine friars at Erfurt, on St. Alexius's 
day, July 17th, 1505. Having obtained his first 
degree at the university, he becomes a monk. 

" I became a monk," he wrote some time afterwards 
to his father, " not willingly, still less to fatten my 
body, but because, when I was encompassed by the 
terror and fear of quick-coming death, I vowed a forced 
and hasty vow." * 

Only two Latin poets, Virgil and Plautus, now his 
sole property, accompanied him into the cell of the 
cloister ; he crossed its threshold while yet engaged in 
anxious internal strife. Like a prophecy of future 




LUTHER ENTERS THE MONASTRY OF THE AUGUSTINES. 150.5. 



REFORMATION I N GERMANY. 



31 



liberation did the statue of St. Augustine, the tutelary 
saint of his order, whose words were destined at a 
later period to become for him a guide to the living 
waters, look down upon him. 

u I entered the monastery and left the world," he 
says, " despairing of myself. I thought God would 
not take my part ; and if I meant to go to heaven, and 
be saved, it must be by my own efforts. For this 
reason I became a monk, and laboured hard." 



LUTHER SOLEMNLY ORDAINED A PRIEST. 

The master of arts has become a monk, the monk 
now becomes a priest. The vow of the monk and the 
ordination of the priest are raised like two walls be- 
tween Luther and the profane world, between him and 
the original Gospel. 

On Sunday, Cantate, May 2d, 1507, he read mass 
for the first time. " It is a fine thing," he said later, 
" to be a new priest and to celebrate mass for the first 
time ! Blessed was the woman who had borne a 
priest. A consecrated parson, as compared with a 
common baptised Christian, was like the morning star 
compared to a flickering wick." 

"As the glorious God, holy in all his works," he 
writes to Brown a few days before his ordination, 
" has deemed me, an unworthy sinner, fit to be raised 



32 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



thus highly, and in his exceeding mercy has called 
me to his most solemn service, I am in every way 
bound to undertake the task which has been intrusted 
to me, that I may be as grateful for his divine good- 
ness as it is possible for such dust as I." 



CHAPTER III. 

luther's bodily and mental self-torments. 

Neither monkish vow nor ordination, however, 
could bring peace to this troubled heart yearning after 
God. 

" I have indeed" — these are his own words — " kept 
the rules of my order with great perseverance and 
zeal ; I have often been sick and almost dead with 
fasting. A disgraceful persecutor and murderer of 
my own body I was ; for I fasted, prayed, watched, 
wearied, and exhausted myself beyond my strength. 
We had been brought up under these human ordi- 
nances, which had obscured Christ, and made him of 
no avail to us ; I thought that my monkery would be 
all-sufficient ; for I did not believe in Christ, but took 
him to be only a dreadful judge, as he was painted 
sitting on a rainbow. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



33 



" The more I strove to pacify my conscience by 
means of fasting, watching, and praying, the less quiet 
and peace I felt ; for the true light was hidden from 
mine eyes. The more I sought the Lord, and thought 
to approach him, the further I departed from him. 

" There is no greater 'affliction and misery in this 
life, than the pain and trouble of a heart that is lost, 
and knows no counsel or consolation. There is no 
heavier suffering than sorrow of the heart ; for that is 
death and hell itself. Then let who can unlock and 
lock again this hell, in order that such a weak and 
troubled heart may not altogether expire when it is 
conscious of sin, and suffers such martyrdom thereat." 

Nothing external, not the martyr's cross which he 
embraced, not the castigations with which he tormented 
himself, could satisfy the longing of his soul. 

LUTHER FAINTING IN HIS CELL; IS REVIVED BY MEANS 

OF MUSIC. 

According to Seckendorfs account, this event oc- 
curred at Wittenberg, where Luther's friend, Eden- 
berger, roused him with a sacred song, which he and 
the boys of the choir sang at his door ; but the more 
generally believed version is that this event occurred 
in the monastery at Erfurt. It is more than probable 
that such instances of abstraction and the arousing 
3 



34 



MARTIN 



LUTHER, AND THE 



from it occurred more than once. " For music," thus 
Luther spoke in praise of the art, " is the best cordial 
for a sorrowful man, which maketh the heart contented, 
refreshed, and vigorous." 

" I made myself," he states, referring to that period, 
" so well acquainted with the Bible, that I knew the 
page and place of every text. No other study than 
that of the Scriptures interested me; I read them 
zealously, and imprinted them on my memory. Many 
a time one single significant text dwelt in my thoughts 
for a whole day." 

LUTHER MENTALLY AND CORPOREALLY EXHAUSTED, IS 
STRENGTHENED BY THE CONSOLING EXHORTATIONS OF AN 
OLD MONK. 

Still more powerfully than by music was Luther 
strengthened by the living word of God from the 
mouth of a believer. " God sent him," relates Mathe- 
sius, " an old brother of the monastery as a confessor, 
who consoled him affectionately, and pointed out to 
him the merciful forgiveness of sins as announced in 
the apostolic confession of faith ; and who taught him, 
from the sermons of St. Bernard, that he ought to have 
this faith also with regard to himself, that our merciful 
God and Father had granted him forgiveness of all 
his sins through the sole sacrifice and blood of his Son, 
and had announced the same, through the Holy Ghost, 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



35 



in the apostolic church, by the word ' absolution.' 
This proved a living and powerful consolation to our 
Doctor's heart, in that he hath often made honourable 
mention of his confessor, and heartily thanked him." 
Seckendorf, in his account of Luther having been 
comforted on his sick-bed by an old monk, apparently 
confounds this event with an earlier one, when Luther, 
before his entrance into the monastery, was, during a 
serious illness, consoled by an old monk in these 
words: "Be comforted, my young bachelor of arts, 
thou shalt not die of this attack ; our God will yet 
make of thee a great man, who is to comfort many 
people. For whom God loveth,. and whom he wills 
to prepare for salvation, on him he early lays the 
cross ; in which school of the cross patient people may 
learn much." 

Luther himself says of these attacks : " In the 
great temptations which I suffered, and which con- 
sumed my body so that I had no breath, no man could 
comfort me." 

The living power which dwelleth in the communion 
of faith Luther experienced for the first time at the 
words of that grey-headed man. It was his first con- 
ception of the true imperishable church. 



36 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

LUTHER, AS BACHELOR OF ARTS, LECTURES ON PHILOSOPHY 
AND DIVINITY. 

Luther, in his twenty-fifth year, steps from the 
monk's cell, as teacher, into the lecture-room; the 
worst period of his mental troubles is past; the feel- 
ing of inward freedom strives for a first imperfect 
utterance. 

Having been called in 1508 to the new university 
at Wittenberg, he there delivered his first course of 
lectures on philosophy (on that of Aristotle), and 
afterwards another on divinity (on the Psalms and the 
Epistle to the Romans.) "Here Brother Martin 
begins to study the Scriptures, and begins, at the 
High School, to contend against that sophistry which 
prevailed every where at that time." Among his 
hearers at that time was the first rector of the 
new university, Dr. Pollich of Melrichstadt, physician 
to the Elector Frederick, and afterwards also doctor 
of divinity. Of him Mathesius says : " Dr. Pollich, 
who was at that time a lux mnndi (light of the world), 
that is to say, a doctor of laws, of medicine, and of 
monastic sophistry, would not forget even at table the 
arguments and conclusions of the monk. ' That 
monk,' he often said, as I have heard from the mouth 
of his brother Walter, 4 will confound all the learned 
doctors, propound a new doctrine, and reform the 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



37 



whole Roman church ; for he studies the writings of 
the prophets and the evangelists; he relies on the 
word of Jesus Christ — no one can subvert that, either 
with philosophy or sophistry.' " According to Pollich, 
Luther himself said, " Let the doctors be the doctors ; 
we mutit not hearken to what holy church says, but 
to what Scripture says." 

Many years afterwards, in 1528, Luther expresses 
himself as follows, writing to Staupitz : "Through 
thee the light of the Gospel was lit up for the first 
time in the darkness of my soul." 

LUTHER PREACHES IN THE MONASTERY BEFORE STAUPITZ 
AND THE OTHER BRETHREN, PREPARATORY TO PREACHING 
IN THE PALACE AND TOWN CHURCHES. 

Luther the teacher is also to have a cure of souls ; 
the man of the school is to become the man of the 
church. Unwillingly and fearfully did he comply 
with the wish of his paternal friend Staupitz, that he 
should preach. " Oh, how I dread the pulpit ! It is 
no trifling thing to speak to the people in the name 
of God, and to preach to them !" 

His first sermons, until the town church was open 
to him, he delivered in the small ruinous chapel of 
his monastery, only thirty feet long and twenty broad. 
Myronius says, " This chapel might be compared to 



38 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



the stable in which Christ was born. In this miser- 
able building it was the will of God that his Gospel 
was to be preached, and his beloved Son Jesus Christ 
as it were to be born again; not one among the 
cathedrals or other grand churches did he choose for 
these excellent sermons." " When I was a young 
preacher/' says Luther himself, " I was fully in ear- 
nest, and would willingly have made all the world 
pious." — " God has led me to it as he did Moses. Had 
I known all beforehand, he would have had greater 
trouble ere he had led me thus far. Well, as I have 
begun, I will go through with this work." 

Staupitz, who listened to the first sermon of his 
spiritual foster-son, lived to see the plant flourish 
which he had helped to rear. 



CHAPTER IV. 

luther's journey to rome, 1510. 

A vow had led young Luther into a monastery; 
another vow (added to a commission from his monas- 
tery) took him to Rome. In the monastery, as on 
his pilgrimage thither, experience awaited him: in 
each case to be grievously undeceived. 



REFORMATION I N GERMANY. 



39 



"In the year 1510/' writes Mathesius, "his monas- 
tery sent him to Home. There he saw the holy father 
the Pope, and his pompous religion and impious 
courtiers. This greatly strengthened him afterwards." 

When he came with his companions in sight of 
Rome, he raised his hands and cried, "I greet thee, 
thou holy Rome ! yes, truly holy through the blood 
of the martyrs which was here shed." Of the out- 
ward show of the prince of the church, he says, 
" Rome has now its pomps ; the Pope goes about in 
triumph, fine, richly adorned horses before him, and 
he beareth the host on a white horse." 

Luther left the holy city with a sharp thorn in his 
side. " I would wish that every one who is to become 
a preacher had been first at Rome, and seen how 
matters are carried on there." Mathesius says that 
he frequently expressed himself to the effect, " he 
would not take a thousand florins not to have been at 
Rome." " I have myself heard it said at Rome, ' It 
is impossible that matters can remain in that state; 
things must change or break down.' " Again, " Pope 
Julius said, ' If we do not choose to be pious ourselves, 
let us at least not prevent others.' I have heard say 
at Rome, 'If there be a hell, Rome has been built on 
the top of it.' Rome has been the most holy city; 
but now it has become the most unrighteous and dis- 
graceful. Whoever has been at Rome knows well 
that things are worse there than can be expressed in 
words, or believed." 



40 



MARTIN LUTHER, 



AND THE 



LUTHER IS WITH GREAT SOLEMNITIES CREATED AND CON- 
SECRATED DOCTOR OF DIVINITY AND TEACHER OF THE 
HOLY SCRIPTURES. 

On the 18 th and 19th of October, 1512, Luther was 
solemnly sanctified to his great work, as teacher of 
his people and his church. 

Mathesius says, " Brother Martin was appointed on 
St. Luke's day doctor of the holy Scriptures, and took 
the oath, and promised to study and proclaim them 
all his life ; also to defend the holy Christian faith in 
writing and preaching against all heretics, so help him 
God !" 

Luther says : " But I, Doctor Martinus, have been 
called upon, compelled to become a teacher, without 
any wish of my own, from pure obedience. I had to 
take upon myself the degree of doctor, and vow and 
promise to my beloved holy Scriptures that I would 
teach and preach them faithfully in their purity. 
Teaching accordingly, popedom has come in my way, 
and wanted to stop me ; the consequences whereof 
may be seen by all who have eyes." 

Staupitz had had as much trouble to persuade 
Luther to accept the dignity of doctor, as previously 
to persuade him to preach. To his many objections 
Staupitz replied, " It seems that our God will soon 
have much work to be done for him in heaven and 




LUTHER IS WITH GREAT SOLEMNITIES CREATED AND CONSECRATED 
DOCTOR OF DIVINITY AND TEACHER OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 41 

upon earth, and therefore he will need many young 
vigorous doctors to fight his battles. Whether you 
live or die, God has need of you in his councils." 

Karlstadt presided at the solemnity as theological 
dean (decern). 

LUTHER OCCUPIED WITH THE DUTIES OF VICAR-GENERAL OP 
THE AUGUSTINES, WHICH HAD BEEN INTRUSTED TO HIM 
BY STAUPITZ. 

To the mental preparation which Luther had al- 
ready undergone, a greater experience of life and a 
more extended intercourse with his fellow-men was 
now to be added. As locum tenens for his friend Stau- 
pitz, he had an opportunity of acquiring the habits of 
active life. 

" About this time Staupitz was dispatched to the 
Netherlands to bring relics from a monastery. In the 
mean time Luther received the office of vicar, which 
included the supervision of the monasteries of the 
Augustines, and the order to institute a visitation of 
them. For this purpose he travelled from one to the 
other, assisted the schools, and admonished the brethren 
to study the Bible, and to live holily, peaceably, and 
chastely." 

In a letter of the 26th of October, 1516, he thus 
describes to his friend Lange, at Erfurt, the extent of 



42 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

his daily occupations : " I might find work for two 
clerks almost, for I am occupied all day in writing 
letters. I am preacher to the brotherhood, reader at 
meals (ecclesiast) , have to preach daily before the 
community, am also inspector of studies. I am vicar ; 
and that means as much as ten priors [id est undecies 
prior) . I lecture on St. Paul and on the Psalms ; and 
am, beside all this, overburdened with household 
matters." 

By the weight of all these labours for the eternal as 
well as the temporal welfare of those intrusted to his 
care, was the future head of the new church to be 
prepared for the arduous duties of the spiritual govern- 
ment of the church. 

" The word of a brother repeated and made known 
from the Scriptures, and spoken in times of trouble 
and danger, is weighty and important." " If thou 
believe as firmly as thou ought," he writes in 1516, 
" then bear patiently with thy disorderly and erring 
brethren ; look upon their sins as thine own, and what- 
ever of good there be in thee, let it be theirs. If thou 
be a rose and lily of Christ, know that thy path must 
lie among thorns, and see that thyself become not a 
thorn through impatience, haughtiness, or secret 
pride." 

On this journey of visitation already he became 
conscious in his inmost soul of his future calling; for 
when he learnt in the monastery at Grimma, how 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



43 



Tetzel, the trafficker in indulgences, was carrying on 
his trade at the neighbouring town of Wurzen, he ex- 
claimed angrily, " I will make a hole in this drum, so 
God will !" 

It was the first distant lightning-flash, the pre- 
monitor of the coming storm. The Reformer was 
prepared for his great work. 

LUTHER AFFIXES HIS NINETY-FIVE PROPOSITIONS TO THE 
CHURCH-DOOR. 

Unpretendingly began the greatest work of modern 
times by a German monk's affixing his ninety-five 
Theses to the church-door at Wittenberg. But this 
unpretending beginning became soon the awakening 
cry to all Christendom. 

" By Tetzel's, the seller of indulgences, audacious 
talk and abuse, he caused our Luther to buckle on his 
spiritual armour, and seize David's sling and the sword 
of the Lord, which meaneth ardent prayer and the 
pure word of God ; and relying for protection on his 
doctor's degree and his oath, he, in the name of God, 
assailed Tetzel and his Eoman indulgences, teaching 
boldly that they were dangerous delusions." 

The artist represents in his sketch* the church-doors 
at Wittenberg as symbolical of the great gate of the 



See Frontispiece. 



44 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

universal Christian church, at which Luther knocks 
warningly and admonishingly with his Propositions. 

LUTHER BEFORE CAJETAN. 

Luther appears before the Pope's legate, Cardinal 
Cajetan, at Augsburg, to defend his doctrine. Although 
kneeling reverently, according to custom, he courage 
ously refuses to recant, as he is ordered. 

Angered by the obstinacy of the German, the 
Italian flings the written defence at his feet, saying 
wrathfully : " Appear not again before mine eyes, un- 
less thou recant." 

" Because he sat there representing the Pope," are 
Luther's own words, " he insisted that I should submit 
and agree to all he said ; while, on the contrary, all 
that I said against it was contemned and laughed at, 
although I quoted the Scriptures ; in short, his fatherly 
love went no further than that I must suffer violence 
or recant, for he declared he would not dispute with 
me." 

The artist has sought to depict the moment in 
which Luther picks up the paper which Cajetan has 
thrown down, while his friend Staupitz, evidently 
frightened at the wrath of the church dignitary, tries 
to pacify both. Luther, according to the advice of 



REFORMATION I N GERMANY. 45 

his friends, and assisted by Staupitz and Councillor 
Langemantel, left Augsburg at night, through a small 
portal : " Staupitz had procured me a horse, and sent 
an old horseman with me who was acquainted with 
the road. I hastened away, without breeches, boots, 
spurs, or sword, and reached Wittenberg." 

luther's disputation with dr. eck at leipzic, 1519. 

In Augsburg Luther had contended with the proud 
prince of the church of Rome ; at Leipzic he was to 
defend his doctrine against the men of the schools in 
learned debate. On this occasion he spoke the deci- 
sive word to Dr. Eck : " I do not recognise any man 
as the head of the church militant but Jesus Christ 
only, on the ground of holy Scriptures." " For Luther, 
like the true Samson, pulled down the pillar on which 
the Eomans rested the power of the Pope, and said, 
'that the text on which Dr. Eck relied — Thou art 
Peter, and on this rock will I build my church — did 
not refer to St. Peter, still less to any of his successors, 
but to the Lord Jesus Christ, who was the true rock 
on which Christianity might stand against all the 
attacks of hell.' " (Mathesius.) 

During this debate, the youthful Melanchton sat 
by Luther's side, in silent, anxious thought, while 
the more lively Karlstad t sought to assist his own 



46 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



weak memory by referring to books. Duke George 
of Saxony sat listening attentively to the disputants, 
until at the words of Luther, "that even some of 
the propositions of Huss and of the Bohemians were 
perfectly Christian and evangelical," he angrily cries 
cut, " Plague take it !" 



CHAPTER V. 

LUTHER BURNS THE PAPAL BULL. 

Neither cardinals nor doctors, neither negotiations 
nor disputations, could adjust the quarrel. A rupture 
ensued ; Rome condemned the Wittenberg doctor; the 
doctor solemnly declared the Roman judgment to be 
naught ; he burnt the Pope's bull containing his con- 
demnation. 

" But when the people from Louvain and other un- 
iversities, the monasteries, and the bishops, attacked 
Luther's work with glowing fire, such fire having been 
stirred up and blown into a flame by the Pope at 
Rome, the spirit of God came upon this second Sam- 
son. On the 10th of December he once more caused 
a great fire to be made at Wittenberg before the Elster 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



47 



gate, and into it he himself threw the decrees of the 
Pope, also the bull of Leo X., saying, ( Because thou, 
godless book, hast aggrieved or defamed the saint of 
the Lord, let eternal fire aggrieve and consume thee.' " 
(Mathesius.) 

luther's reception at worms. 

Luther is led from the quiet cell of the cloister, 
from the lecture-rooms of the university, from the 
midst of his powerfully-roused community, upon a 
yet greater scene : all Germany looks upon him as 
upon no other ! The monk, the preacher, and the 
teacher of Wittenberg has become the man of the Ger- 
man nation. 

He enters Worms, in the midst of his people, who 
joyfully greet the man upon whom they found their 
hopes; old and young, men and women, high and 
low, clergymen and laymen, all unite in one group. 

Beside Luther in the carriage were his friends, 
Amsdorf, Petrus von Suaven, and the monk Pezen- 
stein; Justus Jonas and many Saxon noblemen, who 
had gone to meet him, followed on horseback. Thou- 
sands of people from all ranks accompanied him to 
his abode in the " Deutschen Hof." 



48 



MARTIN LUTHERj AND THE 



LUTHER PREPARES HIMSELF BY PRAYER FOR HIS APPEAR- 
ANCE BEFORE THE EMPEROR AND EMPIRE. 

But this waving flood of the people, which on that 
day bore him upwards so mightily, is not the principal 
nor the strongest shield of his heart. This beating, 
warring heart appeals to a higher protection, — to the 
eternal rock amidst the flood of time and of nations. 

Streets and hostelries have become quiet, the masses 
which to-day shouted his welcome are silent ; but he 
seeks to compose his mind with music, and by gazing 
upwards into the sacred stillness of the starry sky ; 
— he prays : 

" Almighty, eternal God, how poor a thing is this 
world! how little a matter will cause the people to 
stand open-mouthed ! how little and mean is the con- 
fidence of man in God ! Do thou, Lord, assist me 
against all worldly wisdom and understanding ; do this, 
thou must do it, thou alone! It is not indee:! my 
cause, but thine own ; I myself have nothing to do 
here and with the great princes of this world. But 
it is thy cause, which is just and eternal ; I rely upon 
no man. Come, oh, come ! I am ready to give up 
even my life patiently, like a lamb ; for the cause is 
just; it is thine, and I will not depart from thee eter- 
nally. This I resolve in thy name : the world cannot 
force my conscience. And should my body be de- 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 49 

stroyed therein, my soul is thine, and remaineth with 
thee for ever." 

The evening afterwards, when he was about to 
appear before the emperor, he met at the very thres- 
hold of the hall the knight George of Fronclsberg; 
who, laying his hand upon Luther's shoulder,' said 
kindly, " Monk, monk (' Monchlein' being a caressing 
diminutive), thou enterest upon a path, and art about 
to take up a position, such as I and many other com- 
manders have never braved even in our most serious 
battle-array. If thou have right on thy side, and be 
sure of thy cause, then go on, in the name of God, 
and be comforted ; God will not forsake thee !" Thus 
spoke, if we are to believe in tradition, the knight of 
this world to the spiritual knight, — the military hero 
to the hero of the faith ; he spoke with noble modesty, 
as the inferior to the higher warrior. 



4 



50 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



CHAPTER VI. 

LUTHER BEFORE THE EMPEROR AND THE EMPIRE, 1521. 

The decisive moment has come ! Before the Em- 
peror and the Empire Luther is to prove whether the 
power of conscience is stronger in him than any other 
consideration. And it was stronger. "My conscience 
and the word of God," he says, " hold me prisoner ; 
therefore I may not nor will recant ! Here I stand ; 
I cannot do otherwise ; God help me. Amen !" 

" This is one of the glorious days," exclaims Mathe- 
sius, "before the end of the world, on which the 
word of God has been professed and confessed publicly 
with Christian rejoicings before the Roman emperor 
and the whole empire of Germany !" 

Next to the young Emperor Charles, sits his brother 
Ferdinand ; at their sides the three spiritual and the 
three temporal electors — the wise Frederick of Saxony 
sits in front ; opposite, on the bench for the princes, 
we see Philip of Hesse looking attentively at Luther. 
Dr. Hieronymus Schorf stands behind him as his legal 
adviser; opposite to him, at the table covered with 
Luther's works, we see the imperial orator and official 
of the Archbishop of Treves, Dr. John Eck; nearer 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



51 



to the emperor, the Cardinal Alexander holds in his 
hand the bull containing the condemnation of Luther. 
Tn the background are seen the Spanish sentinels 
who mocked the German monk as he retired from the 
presence. 

LUTHER CARRIED OFF BY HIS FRIENDS ON HIS 
RETURN, 1521. 

Neither Spaniard nor Koman was to lay hand on 
the teacher of the German nation, so strong in the 
faith; German fidelity and noble princely care had 
prepared for him a secret asylum. 

"But because Luther had been outlawed by the 
Emperor and excommunicated by the Pope, God 
inspired the wise Elector of Saxony to give orders, 
through confidential and trustworthy persons, to 
take prisoner for a time the outlawed and excom- 
municated Luther, as the pious servant of God, 
Obadiah, the teacher of King Ahab, kept one hundred 
priests for a time concealed in a cavern, and fed them, 
while the Queen Jezabel sought their life. Our doctor 
consented to this step at the anxious desire of good 
people." (Mathesius.) 

Captain Berlepsch and Burkard Hund, Lord of 
Altenstein, with their servants, stopped Luther's 
carriage in a hollow way near the Castle of Altenstein. 
in the direction of Waltershausen, and carried him 



52 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



off. His companion, Amsdorf, had to proceed alone, 
Luther's younger brother having fled, alarmed at 
sight of the approaching horsemen. 

LUTHER BEGINS HIS TRANSLATION OF THE BIBLE AT THE 
WARTBURG. 

The heroic monk has suddenly vanished from the 
busy market-places of the world ; we find him in the 
quiet chamber of a Thuringian castle disguised as 
Master George, absorbed in the study of that volume 
which, since the dark days of Erfurt, had become the 
shining star of his life. This book was now to speak 
in the German tongue to German hearts ; such was 
Luther's resolution, and his labour in his Patmos. 

" While our Doctor was kept quite secretly at the 
Wartburg, he was not idle, but pursued daily his 
studies and his prayers, and devoted himself to the 
Greek and Hebrew Bibles, and wrote many kind con- 
solatory letters to his friends." (Mathesius.) 

" In the mean time," he writes, " I intend to trans- 
late the New Testament into our mother tongue, as 
our people wish. Oh, that every city had its own 
translator; so that this book might be in the hands 
and hearts of every one ! .... I have taken upon 
myself a burden which surpasses my strength. Now 
only I perceive what a translation means, and why 
hitherto no one has ventured to put his name to one. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



53 



It is to be hoped that we may give to our Germany 
a better translation than the Latins possess. It is a 
great work, well worthy that we should all labour 
thereat." 

luther's departure on horseback from the wart- 
burg — LUTHER AND THE SWISS STUDENTS IN THE INN 

CALLED THE BLACK BEAR, AT JENA LUTHER IN THE 

CIRCLE OF HIS WITTENBERG FRIENDS IS RECOGNISED BY 
THE SWISS STUDENTS. 

The spiritual knight left his Patmos armed with his 
best weapon, — his Bible. The news of the distur- 
bances and confusion at Wittenberg bereft him of all 
peace in his solitude. 

" I come," he wrote to his prince, " to "Wittenberg 
under a much higher protection than that of the 
Elector. In this business the sword neither can nor 
ought to assist. God alone must here work without 
human care or interference : therefore he who hath 
most faith will in this matter protect most." 

In this confidence he had begun his journey ; and 
thoughts like these occupied his mind most likely 
when, at Jena, in the inn called the Black Bear, he 
opened his heart so cheerfully and affectionately to 
the two Swiss students (Johannes Kessler and Riitiner, 
from St. Gall). 

One of them, Kessler, has described this meeting : 



54 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

K Li the sitting-room we found a man sitting alone at 
a table, a little book lying before him ; he greeted us 
kindly, and called us forward to sit beside him at the 
table ; he offered us drink, which we could not refuse ; 
but we did not imagine he was other than a horseman, 
who sat there dressed according to the custom of the 
country in a red cap, simple breeches and jacket, a 
sword at his side, holding with his right hand the 
pommel of the sword, with the other his book. And 
we asked him — 6 Master, can you tell us whether 
Martin Luther be at this time at Wittenberg, or at 
which place he may be found?' He replied, 'I cam 
well informed that Luther is not at this time at Wit- 
tenberg ; but he is soon to be there. Philip Melanch- 
thon is there, however; he teaches Greek, and Hebrew 
also, both which languages I would truly recommend 
you to study, for they are necessary for understanding 
the Scriptures.' In such conversation he became 
quite familiar with us ; so that my companion at last 
took up and opened the little book which lay before 
him : it was a Hebrew Psalter." 

A few days later these Swiss men meet the same 
horseman at Wittenberg, at the house of their 
countryman Dr. H. Schurf, by the side of Melanchthon. 
" When we were called into the room," relates Kessler, 
" behold, we find Martin, as we had seen him at Jena, 
with Melanchthon, Justus Jonas, Nicolaus Arnsdorf, 
and Dr. Schurf, all telling him what has happened at 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



55 



Wittenberg daring his absence. He greets us 
smilingly, points with his finger, and says, ' This is 
the Philip Melanchthon of whom I spoke unto you."' 

LUTHER CHECKS THE DESTRUCTION OF THE IMAGES OF 
SAINTS, 1522. 

A new epoch, a yet more severe struggle, was now 
to begin for Luther. He had to prove to the world 
whether he could maintain the idea which animated 
him, even against the false deductions which others 
had drawn from it ; whether he could meet and check 
the divisions among those who had hitherto been his 
adherents. From the seed of his doctrine " of the 
liberty of the Christian," there threatened to shoot up 
a harvest of the wildest fanaticism, if he should not 
root it out at the right moment. Already had Karl- 
stadt and the enthusiasts of Zwickau begun to dis- 
tract, by their iconoclastic mischief, the young com- 
munity at Wittenberg. 

But Luther interfered, and preserved the liberty of 
the Gospel. " Do not change liberty into compulsion 
{Machet nur nicht aus clem Frei seirt ein Muss sein)" 
he exclaimed, "that ye may not have to render an 
account of those whom you have led astray by your 
liberty without love." " As I cannot pour faith into 
the heart, I neither can nor ought to force or compel 
any one to believe ; for God only can do this, who 



56 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

alone can communicate life to the hearts of men. We 
are to preach the word; but the result must be as 
God pleases. Nothing can come of force and com- 
mand, but pretence, outward show, and the aping of 
religion. Let us first of all seek to move the heart; 
wherever the heart and the mind of all are not moved, 
there leave it to God ; ye cannot do any good. But 
if ye will carry out such base precepts, I will recant 
all I have written and preached ; I will not stand by 
you. The Word hath created heaven and earth and all 
things ; that Word mast do it, and not poor sinners like 
ourselves" 



CHAPTER VII. 

LUTHER CONTINUES HIS TRANSLATION OF THE BIBLE WITH 
THE ASSISTANCE OF MELANCHTHON, 1523-4. 

From the confused crowd of the iconoclasts, and 
their fanatical excesses, we enter once more Luther's 
silent cell, to witness the quiet and cheerful progress 
of his translation of the Bible. At his side stands 
the younger friend and assistant of the reformer, 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



57 



Philip Melanchthon, the distinguished teacher of the 
Greek language at the young University. According 
to Luther's description, he was " a mere youth in age, 
figure, and appearance ; but a man when one considered 
the extent of his knowledge." 

This was the beautiful period of their friendship, 
when each laboured in the same spirit at their com- 
mon task, full of admiration of the higher gifts of 
the other. " See how beautiful and lovely it is when 
brethren dwell together in unity !" 

Luther says in 1522, "No commentator has come 
nearer to the spirit of the Apostle Paul than my 
Philippus." 

LUTHER PREACHES AT SEEBURG AGAINST THE PEASANTS' 
WAR, 1525. 

The reformation in the church is in danger of being 
swallowed up by a political revolution ; the internal 
freedom of the Christian is to justify rebellion against 
the state. This stormy flood Luther opposes with his 
whole being; shudderingly he seems to look into a 
bottomless abyss that opens before his people. 

In May 1525 he wrote to his brother-in-law from 
Seeburg, where he had warned the people against re- 
bellious proceedings : " Though they were many 
more thousand peasants, they are all of them robbers 
and murderers, who take to the sword for the sake of 



58 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



their own gratification, and who want to make a new 
rule in the world, for which they have from God neither 
law, nor right, nor command ; they likewise bring dis- 
grace and dishonour upon the word of God and upon 
the Gospel : yet I still hope that this will not continue 
nor last. Well, when I get home, I will prepare my- 
self for death with God's help, and wait my new 
masters, the robbers and murderers. But sooner than 
approve of and pronounce right their doings, I would 
lose an hundred necks, so God in his mercy help 
me !" # 

"In this my conscience is secure, although I may 
lose my life. It endureth but a short time, until the 
right Judge cometh, who will find both them and 
us. . . . Their doings and their victories cannot last 
long." 

He had already warned the peasants, some time 
previously, in his " Admonition to Peace," and said : 
" Be ye in the right as much as ye may, yet it be- 
cometh no Christians to quarrel and to fight, but to 
suffer wrong and bear evil. Put away the name of 
Christians, I say, and make it not the cover for your 
impatient, quarrelsome, and unchristian intentions. 
That name I will grudge you, nor leave it you, but 
tear it away from you by writing and preaching, as 
long as a vein beats in my body." 



luther's marriage. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



59 



luther's marriage. 

From the agitation caused by his opposition to the 
iconoclasts Luther had returned to his Bible ; from the 
annihilating struggles of a political revolution he 
turned to the symbolical erection of a Christian 
household, to the foundation of a family in the true 
German and evangelical spirit. 

Even during the storm of insurrection he wrote in 
the spring of 1525, " And if I can fit it, I mean to 
take my Kate to wife ere I die, in despite of the devil, 
although I hear that my enemies will continue. I 
hope they may not take from me my courage and my 
joy." A few weeks later, on June loth, he was 
united to Katharina for life in the house of the town- 
clerk (Stadtschreiber) of Wittenberg : his friend Bugen- 
hagen blessed the sacred union, in the presence of the 
lawyer Apel and of Lukas Kranach. "Beloved 
heavenly Father," so did he pray, "as thou hast 
given me the honour of thy name and of thine office, and 
wiliest also that I should be called and be honoured as 
a father, grant me grace, and bless me, that I may 
nourish and govern my dear wife, child, and servants, 

in a divine and Christian manner I have not 

known how to refuse to my beloved Lord and Father 
this last act of obedience to his will which he claimed 
of me, in the good hope that God may grant me chit 



60 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



dren. Also that I may confirm my doctrine by this 
my act and deed; seeing that I find still so many faint 
hearts, notwithstanding the shining light of the Gos- 
pel I have reaped such great discredit and 

contempt from this my marriage, that I hope the 
angels will rejoice and the devils weep. The world 
and her wiseacres know not nor understand this 
word, that it is divine and holy. . . If matrimony he 
the work of God, what wonder that the world should 
be offended thereat ? Is it not also offended that its 
own God and maker has taken upon himself our flesh 
and blood and given it for its salvation, as a redemp- 
tion and as food ? Matrimony drives, hunts, 

and forces man into the very innermost and highest 
moral condition ; that is to say, into faith — since there 
is no higher internal condition than faith, which de- 

pendeth solely upon the word of God Let the 

wife think thus : My husband is an image of the true 
high head of Christ. In the same manner the hus- 
band shall love his wife with his whole heart, for the 
sake of the perfect love which he seeth in Christ, who 
gave himself for us. Such will be a Christian and 
divine marriage, of which the heathens know no- 
thing It is the highest mercy of God when a 

married couple love each other with their whole hearts 
through their whole lives." And this mercy he en- 
joyed. " My Kate is obedient and amenable to me 
in all things, more so than I had dared to hope. So 
that I deem myself richer than Croesus." 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



61 



THE CONTROVERSY BETWEEN LUTHER AND ZWINGLI ON THE 
SACRAMENT. 

Ten years earlier Luther had stood at Leipzic op- 
posed to the principal and dexterous theological 
champion of the court of Rome ; at Marburg, we find 
him opposing the spiritual head of the Swiss Refor- 
mation. Wittenberg and Zurich, Saxony and Switzer- 
land, represented by their most distinguished pro- 
fessors, debated in the castle at Marburg, from the 1st 
to the 4th of October 1529, upon the theological in- 
terpretation of the sacrament of the Lord's supper, 
and upon the words employed in instituting it. 

The profound mystery of the sacrament of the 
Lord's supper, in its depth and power entirely beyond 
the range, and indeed opposed to the scholastic con- 
troversy, became nevertheless the watchword of 
party. 

Zwingli dreaded a physical interpretation ; Luther, 
on the contrary, dreaded the evaporation of the spiri- 
tual element of the sacrament of the communion. 
One considered that he defended the corner-stone of 
evangelical Protestantism; the other,, the foundation 
of the Christian church. On one side the cry was, 
"the spirit quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing Y 9 
the other side maintained the blessed presence and 
full enjoyment of the entire Christ, the undivided 
Saviour. 



62 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

Profound and insurmountable antitheses of religious 
thought and practice, defying the discriminating power 
of the human understanding ! 

In vain the Swiss sought to establish a cordial 
union, notwithstanding these differences, or rather 
rising above them. " There are no people on earth 
with whom I would more willingly be united than 
those of Wittenberg !" cried Zwingli in tears. " Ye 
have a different spirit from ours !" was Luther's im- 
placable reply. "Conscience is a shy thing; therefore 
we must not act lightly in such great matters, nor 
introduce any thing new, unless we have the distinct 
word of God for it. We deem, truly, that our oppo- 
nents mean well ; but it will be seen that their argu- 
ments do not satisfy conscience, as opposed to the 
meaning of the words, This is my body!' 

Even a Christian and brotherly union was rejected. 
" To-day," says Luther, " the Landgrave proposed 
that we should, although maintaining the different 
opinions, still keep together as brethren and members 
in Christ. But we want not such brethren or mem- 
bers : let us, however, have peace and goodwill !" 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 63 



CHAPTER VIII. 



THE PRESENTATION OF THE AUGSBURG CONFESSION, 1530. 

That which had been heard thirteen years before at 
Wittenberg, on the 31st of October, 1517, like the voice 
of a watchman at midnight, was in full daylight, on the 
25th of June 1530, proclaimed at the court of the 
Bishop of Augsburg, before the Emperor and the 
country, as the steadfast conviction of many thousand 
German hearts. 

" Great is my joy," says Luther, " to have lived till 
this hour, when Christ is proclaimed by such confessors, 
before such an assembly, through so glorious a con- 
fession ! Now the word is fulfilled : 6 1 will speak of 
thy testimony also before kings.' The other also 
will be fulfilled : 6 Thou hast not let me be put to 
shame for ' whosoever shall confess me before men, 
him will I confess also before my Father who is in 
heaven.' " 

In this spirit he comforted his friends with the most 
joyful confidence : "Ye have confessed Christ Jesus; 
ye have offered peace, rendered obedience to the 
Emperor, borne evil, have been covered with con- 
tumely, and have not returned evil for evil. To sum 




64 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



up all, ye have worthily carried on the sacred work, 
as it becometh his saints. Look up, and lift up your 
heads, for your deliverance is nigh !" 

Being in the castle at Coburg — which, from a Sinai, 
lie intended to make his Sion — Luther could only in 
the spirit and in prayer be present with his friends 
during the decisive hours at Augsburg. 

" With sighs and prayer," he writes to Melanch- 
thon, " I am in truth faithfully by your side. The 
cause concerns me also, indeed more than any of you; 
and it has not been begun lightly or wickedly, or for 
the sake of honours or worldly good; in this the Holy 
Ghost is my witness, and the cause itself has shown 
it until now. If we fall, Christ falls with us, he, the 
ruler of the world ; and though he should fall, I w T ould 
rather fall with Christ than stand with the Emperor. 
Christ is the conqueror of the world ; that is not false, 
I know ! Why then should we fear the conquered 
world, as if it were the conqueror ?" 

A witness, Yeit Dietrich, says that he prayed with 
such reverence, that it could be seen he spoke to 
God ; and yet at the same time with such faith and 
hope, that it seemed as if he addressed a father and 
friend. "I know," he prayed, "that thou art our 
God and father; I am therefore sure that thou wilt 
bring to shame the persecutors of thy children. If 
thou do not, the clanger is as well thine as ours. The 
whole cause is thine own. We have been forced to 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 65 , 

put our hands to the work; mayest thou protect it 
now !" 

THE TRANSLATION OF THE BIBLE. 

The members of the evangelical church had pub- 
lished their general confession at Augsburg. It is 
true the source of this confession could only be found 
in the Bible ; and the Bible became their property 
only through Luther's translation. 

" This is one of the greatest miracles," says Mathe- 
sius, "which our Lord has caused to be performed, by 
Dr. Martin Luther, before the end of the world, that 
he giveth us Germans a very beautiful version of the 
Bible, and explaineth to us his eternal divine nature, 
and his merciful will, in good intelligible German 
words. 

" When the whole German Bible had been pub- 
lished, Dr. Luther began anew to revise it with great 
zeal, industry, and prayer. And as the Son of God 
had promised, that i where two or three w<ere gathered 
together in his name, he would be in the midst of 
them,' he caused a sanhedrim, as it were, of the best 
people then about him to assemble weekly, for a few 
hours before supper, at his house; namely, Dr. Bugen- 
hagen, Dr. Justus Jonas, Dr. Kreuziger, Melanchthon, 
Mattheus Aurogallus, and also George Eorer the cor- 
rector. These were frequently joined by strange 
5 



66 



MARTIN LUTHEEj AND THE 



doctors and other learned men, Dr. Bernhard Ziegler, 
Dr. Forstenius, and others. 

" After our doctor had looked through the published 
Bible, and consulted Jews and foreign philologists, and 
had also inquired among old German persons for fitting 
German words, he joined the above assembly with his 
Latin and new German Bible; he had also the Hebrew 
text always with him. Melanchthon brought the 
Greek text ; Dr. Kreuziger, both the Hebrew and the 
Chaldee Bibles. The professors had several tables 
beside them ; and Doctor Pomacer had also a Latin 
text before him. Every one had previously prepared 
himself by studying the text. Then Luther, as pre- 
sident, proposed a passage, and collected the votes, 
and heard what each one had to say on it, according 
to the peculiarity of the language, and the interpre- 
tation of the old doctors." 



THE IMPROVEMENT OF SCHOOLS : INTRODUCTION OF THE 

CATECHISM. 

Among the most beautiful fruits of the reform 
movement w T as the religious instruction of youth in 
the schools of the people ; and nothing lay more at 
Luther's heart. 

" I hold that the magistrates ought to force parents 
to send their children to school. Can they not force 
their subjects to bear pikes and muskets in war-time ? 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 67 

why not much more then to send their children to 
school ? for in this instance a worse war impendeth 
against the detestable devil, who seeketh to drain all 
cities and countries dry of all worthy people, until he 
have extracted the kernel, so that only the empty 
useless shell of worthless people be left standing, 
whom he may play with and deceive as he listeth ! 
Therefore let all those work who can ! Well, my be- 
loved Germans, I have told you enough, ye have heard 
your Prophet !" 

In this spirit he presented to the youth of his 
nation that master-piece of popular instruction in the 
elementary truths of Christianity, his Little Catechism. 

" The wretched miserable want which I witnessed 
formerly when I was still a visitor, has urged and 
driven me to give to this Catechism, or Christian 
teaching, such a small simple form. God help me, 
what wretchedness have I seen ! how ignorant are the 
common people, particularly in the villages, of all 
Christian knowledge ! and how many of the parochial 
priests are unskilful and unfit, alas, to teach them ! 
ye Bishops ! how will ye answer it unto Christ that 
ye have deserted the people thus disgracefully ?" 

It was his greatest joy and greatest restorative to 
see the fruits of his labour ripen among the new 
generation. " Tender youths and maidens grow up 
so well instructed in the Catechism and the Scriptures, 
iiat it soothes my heart to see how, at present, young 



68 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

boys and maidens pray and believe more, and can tell 
more of God and of Christ, than formerly, and even, 
now, all foundation-convents and schools can. Young 
people like them are truly a paradise, such as the 
world cannot show. And all this the Lord buildeth ; 
as though he would say : 6 Well, my much-beloved 
Duke Hanns, I confide to thee my noblest treasure, 
my cheerful paradise ; thou shalt be father over it, 
as my gardener and fosterer.' As if God himself 
were your daily guest and ward, because his word, 
and his children who keep his word, are your daily 
guests and wards, and eat your bread. 

The picture represents the great Keformer in the 
midst of a number of children ; to whom, according 
to the text, " Let little children come unto me," he 
expounds his Catechism, while Jonas is distributing 
the book among them ; and in the background are 
seen a circle of attentive schoolmasters, who are pre- 
paring themselves by listening to his teaching for the 
duties of their calling. 

PREACHING. 

As Luther had translated the Word of God for his 
people into their mother tongue ; as he had interpret- 
ed it in his elementary work for the understanding 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



69 



of children; so did he wish to announce it to the 
assembled community in sermons, as an explanation, 
development, and application of the Word of God, of 
the revelation of God in Christ. Preaching became 
the principal instrument for the foundation and guid- 
ance of the evangelical church. The divine became 
from this time forward pre-eminently a preacher. 

"Therefore mark this, thou parochial priest and 
preacher ! Our office has now become another thing 
than it was under the Pope ; it is now real and bene- 
ficial. Therefore has it much more trouble and 
labour, danger and temptations, and with all that less 
reward and thanks in this world ; but Christ himself 
will be our reward, so we labour faithfully." 

Nor had Luther any sympathy with the heartless 
fanatical endeavour to exclude the arts from public 
■worship. 

" I am not of opinion that all the arts are to be 
rooted out by the Gospel, as some ultra-divines pre- 
tend ; but would wish to see all the arts employed, 
and music particularly, in the service of Him who 
has given and created them." 

THE SACRAMENT OF THE HOLY COMMUNION IN BOTH KINDS. 

" The ivord and the sacrament" was for Luther the 
motto and symbol of the true Christian church. Next 
to the preaching, the most sacred rite of the evan- 



70 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



gelical community is — the celebration of the Lord's 
supper in its original mode and form. By retaining 
and insisting upon the " real presence" in the sacra- 
ment, Luther strove to save the reformed church from 
the double danger of being either split into a number 
of sects unconnected with the great Christian church, 
or driven from its object by the arbitrary opinions of 
the schools. " Whoever doth not require and long 
for the sacrament, of him it may be feared that he 
despises it, and is no Christian; even as he is no 
Christian who doth not hear and believe in the Gos- 
pel, But who doth not reverence the sacrament, that 
is a sign that he has no sin, no world, no death, no 
danger, no hell ; that is to say, he believeth in none, 
although he be sunk in them over head and ears. 
Contrariwise, he needeth not either grace, eternal life, 
the kingdom of heaven, Christ, or God." 



LUTHER READS THE BIBLE TO THE ELECTOR, JOHN THE 

CONSTANT. 

The artist, introducing us to the private life of 
Luther, gives us in the first instance a proof of the 
intimate relation that existed between the Reformer 
and his prince ; we see him in confidential conversation 
with the Elector John, to whom he is reading and 
explaining the Scriptures. As an individual instance, 




LUTHER READS THE BIBLE TO JOHN THE CONSTANT. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



71 



this meeting may not perhaps be capable of historical 
proof; still the picture shows in perfection the beau- 
tiful and unshaken unity of mind and of opinion which 
so closely connected the teacher with the prince, and 
of which history affords ample proof. It was this 
prince, indeed, to whom Luther addressed, in 1530, 
from Coburg to Augsburg, those incomparable words, 
in which the mutual relation between the two men is 
so clearly reflected : " The all-merciful God approves 
himself still more merciful by making his word so 
powerful and effective in your highness's (Euer kur- 
fur&tlichen Gnaclen) lands. For in your dominions, it 
is true, there are more excellent preachers and clergy- 
men, and a greater number of them, who teach purely 
and faithfully, and assist in keeping the blessed peace, 
than in any other country in the world. God our 
Lord, who has appointed your highness father and 
helper over this country, feedeth all through your 
office and service. Let your highness be comforted. 
Christ is come, and will confess you before bis Father, 
as you have confessed him before this wicked race. I 
am grieved that Satan should afflict and trouble your 
heart; he is a sorry bitter spirit, and cannot bear that 
the heart of man should rejoice or be at peace, parti- 
cularly in the Lord ; how much less can he bear that 
your highness should be of good courage, since he well 
knoweth of how much importance your heart is to us 
all ; and not only to us, but to all the world ; nay, 1 



72 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

might almost say to Heaven itself. Therefore we are 
all bound to assist your highness with prayer, consola- 
tions, with love, and in whatever way we. can. Oh! 
the young people will do this, who cry and call, with 
their innocent tongues, so affectingly to Heaven, and 
faithfully recommend your highness to the all-merciful 
God." 

LUTHER ON A SICK-BED 1537, IS VISITED AND COMFORTED 
BY THE ELECTOR JOHN FREDERICK. 

In the last picture Luther appeared as the clerical 
servant of his prince ; the son of that prince afterwards 
visits him kindly in his bodily affliction. He had 
fallen dangerously ill at Schmalkalden, when, on the 
Sunday Invocavit (February 1537), the Elector John 
Fredrick visited and comforted him. " The good God 
our Lord," said that prince, much affected, "will be 
merciful unto us, and prolong your life." When 
Luther, in the fear of death, recommended the Gospel 
to his future protection, he replied : " I fear, dear 
Doctor, that if the Lord were to remove you, he would 
take away his precious word also;" which observation 
Luther properly contradicted. At parting, John 
Frederick sought to comfort him with these words : 
" Your wife shall be as my wife, and your children 
my children." " The pious prince," writes Luther to 
his wife, " sent messengers on foot and on horseback 
to fetch, at any and every expense, whatever might 
be beneficial to me ; but it was not to be." 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



73 



CHAPTER IX. 

LUTHER AT THE SICK-BED OF MELANCHTHON. 

Luther by the side of the suffering Melanchthon, 
raising the almost broken spirit of the sick man with 
the powerful words of life, was a most touching illus- 
tration of Luther's faith, and power in prayer. 
Melanchthon had suddenly fallen sick at Weimar, 
while on his way to the monastery at Hagenau. Pre- 
sentiments of death had accompanied him thither ; 
and a mental affliction, which undermined his strength, 
threatened the speedy dissolution of the almost ex- 
hausted powers of life; — his delicately strung mind 
was tormented by the bitterest pain that can assail 
a poor mortal : he was at war with himself, for his 
conscience could not find rest from the reproach that 
he had not resisted more heroically the desires and 
demands of the Landgrave of Hesse, and had thus, it 
might be said, sanctioned, in part at least, a public 
slight offered to the evangelical church. 

At the call of the Elector, Luther and Kreuziger 
came to him : the former saw with terror the corpse- 
like form of his friend, the failing eyes, the fleeting 



74 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

sense. " God preserve me !" he cried, " how has the 
devil destroyed this organon!" and turning to the 
window, he poured out his anxious soul in the boldest 
and most glowing prayer. Words passed through his 
soul and crossed his lips which, coming from another 
mouth, might be condemned as blasphemy, but which 
in him arose from the very depth of a sublime con- 
fidence in God, and from an unconditional faith in the 
Scriptures. "This time I besought the Almighty 
with great vigour, I attacked him with his own wea- 
pons, quoting from Scripture all the promises I could 
remember, that prayers should be granted, and said 
that he must grant my prayer, if I was henceforth to 
put faith in his promises." He then took the hand 
of the sick man, saying, " Be of good courage, Philip, 
thou shalt not die ; although the Lord might see cause 
to kill, yet wills he not the death of the sinner, but 
rather that he should turn to him and live ! God hath 
called the greatest sinners unto mercy ; how much less 
then will he cast off thee, my Philip, or destroy thee 
in sin and sadness! Therefore do not give way to 
grief, do not become thine own murderer, but trust in 
the Lord, who can kill and bring to life, who can strike 
and heal again." Melanchthon would rather have 
passed away in sleep to eternal peace, than have re- 
turned to earthly strife ; but the spiritually powerful 
words of Luther recalled him, " No, no, Philip, thou 
must serve the Lord our God still further !" 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



75 



He recovered ; " recalled 
says himself, " by divine 
joicingly said, "he would 
Philip, with the help of 
cheerfulness. 



from death unto life," he 
power;" and Luther re- 
bring back the Magister 
God, from the grave to 



luther's singing at home, introduction of the 
german church hymns and chants. 

From Luther's friends we turn to his domestic re- 
lations; to which his singing at home (Cantorei im 
Hause) forms a fitting link of connexion, w r hile it 
serves at the same time as a record of the immortal 
fame he has acquired by his zeal in improving German 
vocal church-music. 

In the picture he is represented surrounded by his 
children and friends practising the first evangelical 
church-melodies under the direction of the electoral 
chapel-master, John Walther. To the left stands the 
cantor, to the right Mathesius. 

" I have," relates Walther, " sung many a delightful 
hour with him ; and have often observed how our be- 
loved friend became more and more cheerful as we 
sang, and never grew weary nor had enough of it. 
He has himself composed the chants to the Epistles 
and Gospels, has sung them to me, and asked my 
opinion. He kept me three weeks at Wittenberg, 
until the first German mass had been chanted in the 



76 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

parish church. I attended it, and afterwards took a 
copy of this first German mass with me to Torgau,, 
that I might present it to the Elector. 

" At table, as well as afterwards, the Doctor sang 
sometimes, he also played the lute ; I have sung with 
him; between the songs he introduced good words. 

Once, during Advent 1538, when he had the 

singers at table with him, and they sang beautiful 
motettes, he said with emotion: 'As our Lord pours, 
out such noble gifts upon us in this life, how glorious 
will be eternal life ! This is only materia prima, the 
beginning.' " (Mathesius.) 

In the preface to his first collection of sacred songs 
and psalms he says that they had been set for four 
voices, because he wished " that the young people, 
who ought at all events to be instructed in music and 
other proper arts, might be rid of their improper love- 
songs, and learn something good and instructive in- 
stead ; and to find pleasure in that which is good, as 
it beseemeth young people." 

luther's joys of summer in the bosom of his family, 
and his ordinary dinner-guests. 

The artist here presents to us Luther's summer 
pleasures in the circle of his family ; and at the same 
time calls attention to those habitual guests at his 



REFORMATION" IN GERMANY. 



77 



table, to whom (as indicated by the young man who 
is writing behind Luther) we owe the noting down of 
his table-talk. A garden-scene could not indeed be 
omitted in a series of pictures, memorials of the man 
whose heart ever opened in the free air, in the sight 
and enjoyment of nature; who gladly observed and 
admired the creation with his pious, thoughtful, and 
poetical eye. 

He wrote to a friend who procured garden-seeds for 
him : " If Satan and his imps rave and roar, I shall 
laugh at him, and admire and enjoy, to the Creator's 
praise, God's blessings in the gardens." He writes to 
Spalatin in 1526 : " I have planted my garden and built 
a well, both with success. Come to me, and thou 
shalt be crowned with roses and lilies !" 

" If I live, I shall become a gardener," he once said, 
while in this humour. " The world knows neither 
God their creator, nor his creatures. Alas ! how would 
man, if Adam had not sinned, have recognised God in 
all his works, and loved and praised him ! Then he 
might have seen and considered the wisdom, might, 
and goodness of God even in the smallest flower ! We 
are at present in the dawn of a future life; for we 
begin to recover the knowledge of creatures which 
we had; lost through Adam's fall. In his creatures we 
recognise the power of his word; how great that is ! — 
He said, and it was so !" 

His profoundly contemplative mind, in its heartfelt 



78 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



enjoyment of nature, looked upon creation as the 
divine symbolic expression of the Invisible aud Highest. 
He compared the Bible, for instance, to a beautiful 
forest, "in which there is no tree at which my 
hand has not knocked." Again, he said on a fine 
spring day (1541) to Justus Jonas, in that tone of 
mind of mingled melancholy and undefined longing, 
which sometimes overpowers us amidst the joys of 
spring : " If there were neither sin nor death, we 
might be satisfied with this paradise. But all shall 
be more beautiful still, when the old world shall have 
been renewed, and a new spring shall open and re- 
main for ever." 



luther's winter pleasures. 

Upon the pleasures of summer follow those of 
winter, — the Christmas festival; and the garden which 
now delights Luther's eyes are his children, whom he 
looked upon as God's greatest blessing. He expressed 
this one day to his friend Justus Jonas, who admired 
the branch of a cherry-tree which hung over the 
table : " Why do you not consider this still more 
in your children, the fruits of your body, and who are 
more beautiful and nobler creatures of God than the 
fruits of any other tree? In them is shown the 
almighty power, wisdom, and art of God, who has 
made them out of nothing." 



REFORMATION I N GERMANY. 



79 



The crossbow with which the eldest boy shoots at 
the apples of the Christmas-tree reminds us of a letter 
which Luther wrote in 1530, from Coburg, to his son, 
then four years old ; and in which he told him of " the 
gay beautiful garden ; the many children ; the apples 
and pears ; the fine little horses with golden bridles 
and silver saddles ; the fifes, cymbals, and grand silver 
crossbows." 

Melanchthon is occupied with the little bowman, 
while " Aunt Lena" looks at a book with the younger 
boy ; and the eldest girl, Magdalen, rejoices in a doll 
representing the angel of the Christmas festival — as 
if she had felt a presentiment of soon becoming an 
angel herself. This hint of the artist prepares us for 
the solemn nature of the next scene. 



LUTHER BESIDE THE COFFIN" OF HIS DAUGHTER MAGDALEN. 

On the altar of his God, from the inmost depths of 
his painfully struggling soul, the father gave up the 
dearest of all he possessed; — his beloved child, ripe 
for heaven while still on earth, he placed resignedly 
into the lap of his Creator and Redeemer. On Wed- 
nesday, September 20, 1542, his Magdalen, not yet 
fourteen years old, closed her eyes for ever in the arms 
of her father, who was praying for her. " I love her 
much," he said at her bedside ; " but if it be thy will, 



80 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

God, to take her, I shall gladly know her to be with 
thee !" When he asked her : " Magdalen, my little 
daughter, thou wouldst gladly remain here with thy 
father; but thou wilt also readily go to thy other 
Father!" the dying child replied: "Yes, dear father, 
as God wills." " My beloved Lena, thou art well be- 
stowed," he said beside her coffin; "thou shalt rise 

again, and shine like a star, nay, like the sun 

Indeed, I rejoice in the spirit, but sorrow in the flesh ; 
the flesh will not submit ; parting grieves us beyond 
all measure." And after the funeral he said : " My 
daughter is now provided for, body and soul. We 
Christians ought not to mourn; we know that it must 
be thus: we are most fully assured of eternal life; 
for God, who has promised it us through his Son, can- 
not lie. God has now two saints of my flesh ! If I 
could bring my daughter to life again, and she could 
bring me a kingdom, I would not do it. Oh, she is 
well cared for ! Blessed are the dead who die in the 
Lord ! whoever dies thus is assured of eternal life. 

1 wish I and my children, and you all, might depart: 
for I see evil times coming." 

There is a holy peacefulness breathing in the words 
of the mourning father, powerfully impressive in their 
solemn simplicity. We seem to hear them : " Thou 
hast given, thou hast taken away; blessed be thy 
name 1" 



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81 



CHAPTER X. 

LUTHER AND HANS KOHLHASE. 

Luther's interview with Hans Kohlhase is a striking 
instance of the Reformer's moral courage, and the 
almost magic influence of his name. 

This unhappy individual, originally an honest 
much-respected man, of a strong and vigorous mind, 
but passionate, and with a keen perception of justice 
and of his own rights, was driven to desperation by a 
series of injuries, and a denial of all redress, inflicted 
upon him by the ruling powers : he became a robber, 
and on several occasions acted in concert with the 
most violent opponents of the constituted authorities 
of that day. A character such as this was well cal- 
culated to inspire Luther with the most lively 
interest; for in the depths of his soul also violent 
passions lay hid, subdued and controlled by his higher 
qualities and by his faith. 

The Chronica of Peter Haftiti states that a warning 
letter which Luther addressed to Kohlhase, and in 
which he solemnly and impressively admonishes him 
to repentance, encouraged the outcast to go to Luther's 
6 



82 



MARTIN 



LUTHER, AND THE 



house, and, without naming himself, implore for ad- 
mission. " It occurred suddenly to Luther that this 
might be Kohlhase; therefore he went to the door 
himself, and said : ' Numquid tu es Hans Kolilliase? to 
which the answer was, i Jam, Domine Doctor! Upon 
this he was let in ; and Luther conducted him solemnly 
to his own room, and sent for Master Philip (Melanch- 
thon) and several other divines. These Kohlhase 
made acquainted with the state of his affairs; and all 
remained with him until late at night. In the morn- 
ing he confessed himself to Luther, received the holy 
communion, and promised that he would abstain from 
violence, and injure the Saxon lands no further. He 
departed, unrecognised and unobserved, from the hos- 
telry; having been consoled by the promise that they 
(Luther and his friends) would advocate his cause, 
and bring it to a good end." When this interference 
proved unavailing, Kohlhase resumed his attempts to 
right himself by violence ; and was at length taken, 
condemned, and executed, 1540. 



LUTHER DURING THE PLAGUE. 

Luther, inspired by the courage which faith gives, 
looked death in the face even when it approached in 
the terrible guise of the plague. This awful disease 
had broken out three times in Wittenberg (1516, 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 83 

1527, 1535) ; and three times he remained in the midst 
of the danger, although he was pressingly requested 
to absent himself. 

"I hope," he wrote to Lange, in 1516, "that the 
world will stand, though Martin Luther fall. I mean 
to disperse the brethren in all directions ; but I have 
been posted here, and here I must remain. I do not 
say this because I do not fear death — for I am not the 
Apostle Paul, but only his commentator — but I trust 
God will protect me from all my fears." Eleven 
years later, when the greater number of the inhabi- 
tants had left, and the university had been removed 
to Jena, he cried : " We are not alone ; Christ and 
your prayers, and those of all the saints, are with us ; 
also the holy angels, invisible, but powerful ! If it be 
the will of God that we should remain and die, our 
care will avail us nothing. Let every one dispose his 
mind this way : if he be bound to remain and to assist 
his fellow-men in their death-struggles, let him resign 
himself to God, and say, ' Lord, I am in thy hand ; 
thou hast fixed me here ; thy will be done.' " 

On All-saints day, ten years after the indulgences 
had been trodden under foot (1527), he complained to 
Amsdorf : " My house is becoming an hospital ; Hanna, 
Dr. Augustin's wife, has carried the plague about w T ith 
her, but she is now recovered; Margaretta Mochina 
frightened us with one boil and other symptoms, but 
she is well again ; for my Kate I fear much, for she is 



84 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

near her lying in; my little son also has been ill for 
the last three days. Thus there is struggle abroad 
and fear within — and both violent enough. Christ 
visits us sorely ; the only consolation which we can 
oppose to the wrath of Satan is, that we have God's 
word for the salvation of our souls, even though he 
destroy our bodies. Therefore do thou and our 
brethren include us in your prayers, that we may 
firmly bear the hand of God." On the 10th of De- 
cember he writes : " I am like a dying man ; and be- 
hold, I live !" At the end of the year he exclaimed 
thankfully : " God hath shown himself wondrously 
merciful unto us." 

luther's last journey — his imposing reception at 

mansfeld. 

The man of battles begins a journey of peace : as 
peacemaker he proceeds to his home ; it was, as he 
had felt it to be, his last journey, which led him to 
eternal peace, and to his real home. " The world is 
tired of me, and I am tired of it ; we shall part easily, 
"as a guest leaves his hostelry not unwilling." 

He had twice attempted in the preceding year to 
adjust the quarrel between the Counts of Mansfeld ; 
and now, accompanied by his three sons, he started a 
third time (January 23d, 1546). His Katherina saw 
him depart with a sorrowful heart, as if she had a 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



85 



presentiment that she should never see him again, at 
least not otherwise than in his coffin. In vain he 
sought to cheer her in his letters by gay and grave 
remarks : " Read St. John and the Little Catechism, 
my beloved Kate, for thou seemest to fear for thy 
God, as ifche were not almighty, and could not create 
ten Dr. Martins, if the one old one were drowned in 
the Saale." " Do not trouble me with thine anxieties ; 
I have a better protector than thee and all the angels. 
He lieth in the manger, or clings to the breast of the 
Virgin, but sitteth also at the right hand of God our 
Father Almighty. Therefore rest in peace. Amen." 

He had escaped death in crossing the Saale during 
a flood (January 28th), that he might depart this life 
a few weeks later at the very place where he had 
entered it, at Eisleben. At the frontiers of Mansfeld 
he was received by the counts with a great retinue : 
he went there to reconcile the brothers and other re- 
lations who were at issue among themselves about 
their worldly possessions. This task was a most 
painful one for him. " In this school," he says, " one 
may learn why the Lord in his Gospel calls riches 
thorns." 

luther's death. 

An eventful great life, of which the results are in- 
calculable, approaches its end; the heart stands still, 
that has beaten so warmly and faithfully for his pec- 



86 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



pie, for Christianity, and for the Gospel. Shortly 
before his end he said, sighing, " Good God ! I feel so 
anxious and troubled ; I am going : I shall assuredly 
remain at Eisleben !" and then he prayed : " I thank 
thee, God, that thou hast revealed thy beloved Son 
Jesus Christ unto me, in whom I have believed, and 
whom I have confessed and preached, and whom the 

sorry Pope and all godless people persecute 

heavenly Father, although I must resign my body 
and be torn away from this life, I know that I shall 
be with thee for ever, and that no one can tear me 

from thy hands God has so loved this world," 

&c. The words which he repeated frequently during 
his last hours were, " Father, into thy hands I com- 
mend my spirit. Thou hast redeemed me, God of 
truth !" When Jonas and Coelius asked him, u Reve- 
rend father, shall you die faithful to Christ and to the 
doctrine you have preached ?" he answered distinctly, 
" Yes." This word was his last on earth, spoken in 
the first hour of February the 18th, 1546. 



luther's obsequies. 

Once more we stand at Wittenberg before Luther ; 
but the eloquent lips are silent, the eye is closed 
which once he raised with holy confidence to the 
emperor and the country, to the pope and the cardi- 
nals ; he is silent for ever in the church to which he 




luther's obsequies. 



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87 



had affixed thirty years before a word that was to 
shake the world. His body had been carried, as 
ordered by the Elector, in solemn procession from 
Eisleben to Wittenberg, that a place of rest might be 
prepared for it in the electoral chapel. Next to the 
coffin stands his friend Melanchthon, who had during 
twenty-eight years fought indefatigably by his side. 
On the morning of the 19th of February he had, 
deeply affected by the news of the death, pronounced 
in his lecture-room, with few but emphatic words, the 
testimony of history and of the Protestant world upon 
the departed : " The doctrine of the forgiveness of 
sins and of faith in the Son of God has not been dis- 
covered by any human understanding, but has been 
revealed unto us by God through this man, whom He 
had raised up." On the day of the funeral also, after 
Dr. Bugenhagen had preached, he once more bore 
witness to the value of the labours of the departed : 
" His doctrine does not consist in rebellious opinions 
made known with violence ; it is rather an interpreta- 
tion of the divine will and of the true worship of 
God, an explanation of the Scriptures, a sermon of 
the word of God, namely, the Gospel of Christ. 
Now he is united with the prophets, of whom he 
loved to talk ; now they greet him as their fellow- 
labourer, and with him thank the Lord who collects 
and maintains his church." 



88 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

Three times has the centenary festival of his death 
been celebrated in Wittenberg, but still Germany and 
the German evangelical church await a second 
Luther. To many has been given the power to 
develop in an equal or a higher degree some one 
single feature of his sublime being ; but where find a 
second time that inexhaustible depth of faith, with 
the same irresistible command of the popular lan- 
guage, united to the same strength of will and readi- 
ness for action? where this blessed absorbing in God, 
with the power of ruling mankind ? where find once 
more that union of qualities, the non-existence of 
which as thus united has constituted for centuries the 
hereditary want of Germany ? Even to-day we still 
ask this at the grave of the German reformer. 



MARTIN LUTHER, 

AND THE 

■fteformatinn in inmanq 



PART SECOND. 

REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



The most important distinction between ancient and 
modern times is the idea of God and the world ; for 
the most essential part, the very soul of an individual, 
of a nation, and of humanity, reveals itself in the 
highest object of their aspirations, of their will and 
their love ; — to be brief, it reveals itself in the inquiry 
after the highest good, after the living God. 

We perceive as the universal feature of the ages 
before Christ, that men sought God in the world ex- 
clusively, that the world was their God : now as crea- 
tive nature, the all-encompassing power, the eternally 
renewing life of the universe ; now as perfect form, as 
corporeal beauty and symmetry ; or as the enjoyment 

(89) 



90 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

of intellectual beauty; or as reason, the clear thought 
complete in itself ; or finally, as a community of law 
and of power in the state. 

Between ancient and modern nations we find a peo- 
ple which recognises God not only in the world, but 
above it, and thus becomes the precursor of a new 
epoch. In another respect this people belongs still to 
ancient times; for the wishes of the majority are 
deeply rooted in the visible and perishable world, so 
that its God appears rather like an external ordinance, 
and not yet as the abstract idea of love. The highest 
spiritual representatives, the prophets and poets, and 
the whole history of this people in the closest con- 
nexion, point all the more urgently to a Being divinely 
great and new in the coming time. 

When that olden time reached its full development, 
when all its latent instincts entered into reality, now 
symbolically, now actively in deeds, then only could 
the great imperishable meaning of all these indications, 
as also their tendency, which was unsatisfactory and 
seductive to the last degree, be placed in the clear 
light of history. It must become evident that all the 
power and fulness of corporeal existence, all perishable 
beauty and reason, all political activity and moral law, 
do not in themselves alone bear the indestructible 
germ of life, that they can give no answer to the last 
decisive questions. 



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91 



The era which divides the old from the new epoch 
began when man recognised the Divinity no longer in 
the world, but found the world in God and through 
Him ; when the Divinity appeared to him no longer 
merely as nature, reason, or law, but as the original 
source and revelation of the most holy love, as " with- 
out controversy, the mystery of godliness, God manifest 
in the flesh." 

This revelation began with the announcement, 
" The kingdom of heaven is at hand :" a new life was 
to open before the human race; it was to be led by 
new paths towards its highest goal ; these paths, as 
w r ell as this end, had become a man, had become a 
person, a history, a divine word and divine act, the 
Saviour of the world. When divine Love descended 
as Saviour into the world in human form, it raised 
man again, through the greatest and freest sacrifice, 
to his first divine destination. 

If we look upon the origin of Christianity as the 
word and deed of divine love, as the salvation and re- 
novation of humanity, embracing all future times, we 
shall see in the essence of all modern history only 
the one grand struggle which the Christian spirit has 
had to maintain against the selfish spirit of this 
world; the development of the new life upon which 
the w^orld had entered, which strives to pervade, re- 
form, and animate all the modes of existence. 



92 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

The reformatory spirit of the new epoch entered into 
history at first as a dominant power, as the exuberant 
fulness of a higher light and life : it was that great 
and unparalleled event of the day of Pentecost, in 
which the past and the future gloriously became one. 
The new divine life appeared to the human mind as 
one in its depth, but manifold in its revelation and 
adaptation : — to the human conscience, as reconcilia- 
tion of the divine Creator to man's sinful race; to the 
heart, as salvation from a shattered and disordered 
existence ; to the plain childlike mind and to the 
abstract thinker, as the mystery of compassionate and 
omnipresent love. As the Master said : " I am the 
way, the truth, and the life." 

That life, when opposed to the then existing forms 
of the world, had on its first appearance to confine 
itself within itself, as a separate circle, as a com- 
munity divided from the rest of the world; its inhe- 
rent power and depth were to be developed, before it 
could pervade the diversified movements of the time. 

In the first instance, the spirit of Christianity had 
free course only in the family circle and the religious 
community; the other sections of common life, the 
state and the school, continued imbued with the spirit 
of this world, in its ungodly emptiness and exclusive- 
ness. But the Christian idea w T as soon to embrace all 
science, and begin to gather to itself the " treasures 



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93 



of wisdom and knowledge" which had been promised, 
so that the great word of the apostle might be ful- 
filled : " All are jours." 



The last step remained to be taken, — to throw open 
to Christianity, now grown strong and tried in the 
storms of time, the arena of the state ; when this was 
done, the Christian state-church came into existence. 
This was a step of immeasurable importance, bitterly 
wept over by thousands since then as the root of 
future corruption, as a victory of worldliness, but 
loudly applauded by others as the spiritualisation of 
the state, as the foundation-stone of the reconciliation 
between state and Christian polity, between God and 
the world. 

But at that time so much is certain, — men were yet 
far from that highest end of temporal development. 
How different would the results have been, if the 
empire of Constantine and the civilisation of the 
period had been pervaded in its. inmost veins and 
nerves by the original spirit of Christianity ! The 
Roman empire was like a worn-out old man who has 
wasted his strength in wickedness ; he is allowed time 
for repentance; but a fresh creation, the fulness of 
life, the freshness of soul, are denied him. Rome, 
however, by her political organisation and civilisation, 
was destined by Providence as the fitting vessel to re- 



94 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

ceive and contain the eternal treasure, and deliver it 
over to coining times. 

Under the shocks of the invading Germanic 
nations, the Roman empire fell into ruins. What 
would then have become of the world, if these un- 
tamed savage nations had not been met by at least 
one power capable of civilising and training them for 
a higher bond of union ? It is true, Christianity did 
not appear to them in its original simple and pure 
form ; it had adopted more imposing forms, and the 
splendours of worldly dignity ; and these splendours, 
these forms, it borrowed from the state, when it be- 
came a state-church. To gain over the world more 
easily and quickly, the church had not disdained a 
close alliance with the old Roman spirit of conquest 
and organisation ; thus she appeared before the victo- 
rious Germanic nations, who learned to bow down to her 
spiritual superiority. 

The old empire of Rome arose again as the church 
of Rome ; the vanquished ruler of the world flourished 
anew as the papacy. In Rome, and among the people 
subject to the Roman sway, the tie was formed which 
was to keep Europe together, no longer as a temporal 
state, but as a spiritual organisation, as a Christian 
church. All political power, on the contrary, rested 
almost entirely with the Germanic nations. In all 



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95 



directions arose warlike feudal states, consisting of 
triumphant conquerors and enslaved subjects. 

Thus, in the middle ages, a twofold conquest, a 
mutual subjection, had been accomplished of the 
Germanic nations through the church of Rome, and 
of the nations subject to Rome through the Germanic 
state. Under the papacy as in the empire, in the 
Roman hierarchy and in the feudal power of Germany, 
the two highest points of development in the middle 
ages had been attained. 

These two dominant powers, both so strong and so 
assuming, could not fail to quarrel one with the other. 
Thus arose that struggle which for centuries continued 
to shake the world, the temporal and the spiritual 
powers, which the emperors of the Frankonian and 
the HohenstaufFen races, and the Innocents and the 
Gregories, carried on with changing fortunes; a 
struggle which gave rise to the theory of the spiritual 
and the temporal sword, or to that popish theory of 
the church being the ruling spirit of the hody politic ; 
while in embittered opponents of church dominion it 
excited the suspicion that Christianity itself was but 
a political invention. Minds more noble and religious 
sought for the source of the existing confusion and 
deterioration in the perversion of Christianity to the 
state-church by Constantine. Walter of the Vogel- 
weide, for instance, the poet of his time, on occasion 
of Constantine bestowing great gifts on the papal 



96 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



chair, causes an angel to lament, " that formerly 
Christianity stood beauteous in its chastity ; but now 
a gift was granted it which would convert its honey 
into gall, to the misfortune of the world." 

The struggle had brought on exhaustion, but no 
solution of the two most profound preblems regarding 
humanity, whose temporal and eternal destiny was left 
undecided and uncomprehended. 

The church of the middle ages had undoubtedly 
great, indisputable merits in relation to the Christian 
world : only ignorance or irreligious stupidity could 
mistake or despise them. The powerful but unre- 
strained and savage nature of the victorious, races was 
prepared by the church for a higher morality and an 
advance in civilisation ; the emblematical language of 
the prevailing visible worship in which Christianity 
clothed itself made a deep impression on the feelings 
and -the imagination of these children of nature. Even 
in this emblematical language, and in this form of 
religion, the tacit promise was conveyed of a future 
more spiritual faith. 

Nor must it be considered a less important benefit 
to European development and civilisation, that in a 
strongly organised church, in a hierarchy established 
on the monarchical principle, a spiritual and moral 
bond was formed, which enchained ail European 
nations in one common union of faith and progress. 



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97 



With this acknowledgment of what the church of 
the middle ages has accomplished, we by no means 
say that its profounder ideas were realised. As yet 
the Christian spirit had, upon the whole, only been 
outwardly understood as a symbol, an ordinance ; 
while life, the world in its multifariousness and liberty, 
was not yet truly impressed and influenced by it. 

There was no want of great attempts to attain this 
last object. Chivalry and monachism were, in their 
origin, nothing less than bold efforts to make good the 
Christian spirit in practical life and in overcoming the 
world. The spirit of chivalry in its most flourishing 
time sought to raise active life to a higher moral 
standard by a powerful and inspired devotedness to 
honour, fidelity, and love. By reverence of the holy 
and beautiful, by protecting the weak and helpless, 
chivalry sought Christian consecration, which after- 
wards found a higher object in the defence and exten- 
sion of the Christian faith through the spiritual orders 
of knighthood, and reached its highest elevation in 
the Crusades. 

Monachism, on the contrary, proceeded from the 
notion, that the material world, notwithstanding all 
the victories of the church, was still lying in darkness, 
that the problem of the inward change of the human 
race through Christianity remained unsolved. To 
attack this evil at the very root, men resolved upon 
an open and unconditional rupture with the world, 
7 



98 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



upon an unconditional subjection and annihilation of 
all that is worldly in man's nature : love of liberty and 
desire of dominion were sacrificed to obedience, per- 
sonal possessions to vows of poverty, and sensual en- 
joyment to self-mortification. The original idea of 
monachism was (who could mistake it !) an energetic 
conception of Christianity as the religion of the 
cross,— a giving up of the world. Erring in the choice 
of means, equally erring and leading to error in the 
conception of its object, it was nevertheless a grand 
attempt at achieving a more real victory over the 
world. 

But both chivalry and monachism had their time : 
first blossom, then decay; attempts at renovation, and 
a relapse. As the spirit of chivalry subsided at last 
into barbarism and absurdity, or the polish of the 
courtier; so monachism sank anew, under the weight 
of the riches and indulgences with which it had loaded 
itself, into the very depths of that worldliness w T hence 
it had so strenuously attempted to extricate mankind. 
Both these attempts at Christian improvement, at a 
victory over this w r orld, ended alike in the very re- 
verse of that which had been their original object. 

We return once more to our previous conclusion : 
the highest task of Christianity remained unaccom- 
plished at the end of the middle ages, and its funda- 
mental ideas were only half understood. In the un- 
bounded striving after worldly dominion, the church 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 99 

of the priests, after having fulfilled one great destiny, 
had lost sight of its true aim. It was, in close con- 
nexion with these spiritual errors, given up also out- 
wardly to the most immoral worldly practices. But 
one loud cry of indignation is heard throughout the 
period at this demoralisation. " Never," so mourns 
the noblest German poet of the thirteenth century, 
" was Christianity so entirely sunk in error : those who 
ought to teach the people are abhorred by God, and 
sin without fear; they show us the way to heaven, and 
themselves go to hell ; their words they say we may 
follow, but not their steps. We all complain that our 
father the Pope confuses us, and yet, like a father, he 
shows us an example ; we follow him, and depart not 
from his footsteps : if he be avaricious, all are ava- 
ricious with him : if he lie, we all lie too ; if he cheat, 
we also cheat. The shepherd has become a wolf; 
young Judas as bad as the old; the treasurer of God 
has stolen his heavenly hoard from him ; he has fal- 
sified the word of God, and resisted his work !" 
Similar and stronger lamentations we find in the poets 
of those days in southern France. In Italy itself, 
Dante, in his Divina Commedia, speaks with rebuking 
wrath of " the lord and protector of the new Phari- 
sees in the Lateran ;" and Petrarch depicts the papal 
court at Avignon in the darkest colours, as the king- 
dom of Greed, where " no crime was feared, so money 
could be gained thereby ; where the hope of a future 



iOO MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

life was called a vain fable ; where the punishment of 
hell, resurrection, and the last judgment, were ac- 
counted children's tales; where truth was called mad- 
ness, self-denial coarseness, and chastity a reproach !" 

The state also, in consequence of the struggle 
against the tyranny and greed of the church, had 
already begun to withdraw itself here and there, not 
only from priestly, but also from religious and moral 
influence ; and to strive for a position and an import- 
ance, sufficient in itself and independent, confined to 
merely perishable objects, and totally disconnected 
from all the eternal principles of existence. From 
these ideas arose the Italian policy, in the same 
country which had become the centre of the church 
in its perfect worldliness ; a policy which, in its com- 
plete and conscious desertion of all divine motives, all 
the moral restraints of life, represents the summit of 
unbounded and self-complacent worldliness. 

If the Christian spirit were to continue its work 
for. humanity, it must create new instruments for the 
task, and through them give a new form to the world. 



As Christianity had at its first appearance kept 
itself secluded from the world, so long as that world 
was in open opposition to its spirit ; so it now broke 
away from the church of Rome, the external form it 
had hitherto assumed, because she had become 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



101 



opposed to its true nature through perversion and 
servility. 

The original spirit of Christianity separating under 
severe struggles from its first historical form, had to 
build its church anew in the sanctuary of the soul, 
and seek its home in the depth of the individual, 
thence to arise as a purified community. 

Now, when the earlier communities of church and 
state had more and more lost their former beneficial 
influence, and the creation of a completely heathenish 
body politic was threatened, by the side of which the 
church would have stood insignificant and ineffectual, 
— how immeasurably important was it, that exactly 
at this moment of religious and moral dissolution, a 
spiritual power should be called forth which led back, 
the worldly spirit to its eternal source, and undertook 
to regulate and raise the life and feelings of nations 
by divine authority! This return to fundamental 
principles, when contemplated in all its bearings, was 
precisely the deepest significance of the epoch before 
the Reformation. 

Through the opening clouds the genius of religion 
and humanity looked once more towards that eminence 
which is its ultimate destination. The development 
of man through Christianity attained its maturity; 
that which had hitherto been given to the youthful 
mind of the people in images frequently significant, 
frequently distorted, and in obscure promises, was now 



102 



MARTIN LUTHER, 



AND THE 



to be offered to the longing spirit as its own possession, 
as its true blessedness; and thus, as the rightful pri- 
vilege of the heart, enter the world again, purifying 
and renovating it from within. From the days of 
the Reformation to our own, we see, therefore, only 
one intimately connected period, which is yet far from 
its conclusion. 

When the Christian spirit abandoned its first strong 
but merely outward worldly form, to address itself, 
confiding in its spiritual power, to the minds of men, 
it undoubtedly entered upon the open sea of life, and 
exposed itself to all the storms of human passion, un- 
certainty, and vacillation. As every great revolution 
throws doubts on all that previously existed, so there 
arose with the Reformation also great dangers for the 
spiritual nature and undisturbed organic development 
of Christianity ; having lost its outward influence pre- 
viously, its moral weight only could be threatened, 
when it was overwhelmed by the new instincts and 
desires, the new ideas and convictions of a differently 
constituted period. 

These dangers showed themselves in their full ex- 
1 tent, when, at a later period, the self-seeking, worldly, 
and carnal interests appeared almost exclusively in 
the foreground, and faith was degraded in the systems 
of politicians to a cipher, until by degrees most of the 
departments of private, political, and ecclesiastical 
life, in mutual conflict, in forgetfulness of their high 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



103 



origin, and in selfish isolation, withered or disappeared 
in lingering dissolving corruption. And yet the 
Christian spirit need not have recoiled affrighted from 
all these dangers ; for, to prove the irresistible power 
of its divine nature, it had to contend, even in a 
modest, form (such as it assumed at the Reformation), 
against all the spiritual and temporal powers of the 
w r orld, and, secure of victory, to strive arduously for 
development during centuries. 

Only to a strong original mind, deeply imbued with 
religion, could a great historical force of so deeply 
spiritual a nature as the Reformation owe its existence. 

Luther, by the peculiarity of his natural abilities 
and of his mind, as well as by the direction of his 
spiritual and worldly experiences, was called upon to 
become the spiritual instrument of this great reform- 
atory power; all the important efforts for improvement 
of the century pervaded his soul in living unity, as 
the germinating force and the suggestive watchword 
of a new era. 



104 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



FIRST SKETCH. 

PREPARATIONS FOR WAR. 

"We have intentionally described these pages, in 
which the striking picture of the Reformer of Germany 
is to be worthily exhibited, as mere historical sketches; 
because we wished to remind every reader at the out- 
set, that it is not our intention to add one more to the 
many biographies of our great man, and to repeat all 
that has been already related so many times, so tho- 
roughly and minutely. Our principal endeavour is, 
rather to work out the rich abundance of historical 
facts, and to arrange them in large, easily compre- 
hended groups, so that the true essential importance of 
the Reformer and of Ms work, for his time and for our 
own, may be depicted in them to the life. Sis import- 
ance for his time and for our own ! these words point 
to the second peculiarity of our task, certainly not the 
easiest, but perhaps the most important. 

The two divisions of our first sketch represent the 
fundamental principle of the Reformation before 
Luther and in Luther: first, those imposing spiritual 
and religious movements in the fourteenth and fif- 
teenth centuries, in which the want of a vivifying and 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



105 



purifying change announced itself more and more 
urgently, and in varied forms ; and then the prepara- 
tion for this change itself in the mind of Luther. 

THE REFORMATION BEFORE LUTHER. 

The fifteenth century bore a new order of things in 
its womb, which, growing out of the gradual decay of 
the creations of the middle ages, now awaited with 
increasing struggles the hour of its birth ; but this 
hour, although announced by so many and significant 
signs, was slow in appearing. A new era working 
itself forth out of a former one, is an extraordinary 
spectacle ; amidst fierce labours and struggles it tries 
to assume a new form, and yet cannot find the certain 
central point round which the new state of things is 
eventually to be organised and established, victori- 
ously and irrecoverably. In the revolution which had 
been begun, religion and mental culture occupied the 
most prominent place : the want of a purification of 
religious faith and life, or, as it was then called, a 
reformation of the church in its head and members, 
became the general cry, the eager demand of all 
Christians ; and never had there been stronger and 
more urgent reasons for this demand. 

The whole order of church-government, as esta- 
blished in the middle ages through the papacy, in its 
influence on the minds and lives of the people, had 



106 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



been entirely unhinged ; instead of representing the 
kingdom of heaven upon earth, according to its origi- 
nal design, it fell into annihilating contradiction with 
the very essence of its existence, and with the most 
important foundations of all higher moral order. A 
more fearful and depressing spectacle can scarcely be 
imagined, than an establishment intended to guide 
and govern religious interests, meant as a blessing, 
turned into a curse by the wickedness of men. Such 
was, at the time of which we speak, the condition of 
society in Europe : men felt the net in which they 
were caught, but seemed powerless to break through 
it, new meshes ever being woven as soon as the old 
ones were torn asunder. 

Religious faith had hitherto represented the clergy 
ideally as the mediators between God and man, and 
monastic life as the highest moral elevation of man- 
kind ; but now the actual state of things showed, to 
all that could see, the most offensive and disgusting 
caricature of this ideal. The clergy of all grades, 
from the Pope to the meanest priest, intended to be 
the defenders of religion, had sunk (at least, the great 
majority of them) into the very lowest depth of de- 
pravity. Upon this point only one voice is heard 
among all serious observers of the time. 

•Popedom had celebrated its triumphs, through its 
most powerful representatives, in the subjection of the 
temporal states, and in strictly carrying out a system 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 107 

of absolute uniform power. But as early as the four- 
teenth century a double defeat had followed upon these 
victories; namely, oppressive dependence upon a tem- 
poral power (France), and the destruction of monar- 
chical unity, by the struggles of several pretenders to 
the papal crown. The highest clerical power thus de- 
stroyed itself, ere any of its subjects dared to lay 
hand on it ; indeed, authority firmly rooted in the 
mind usually falls only by undermining its own power. 
Still, if these two defeats had been all, popedom 
might have recovered from them ; but by its represen- 
tatives and by its system, it destroyed all moral faith 
in both ; and such moral self-destruction must lead 
eventually to external ruin. 

The papacy, we say, destined itself by its system 
and representatives. The system bore on its front a 
conscious and unconditional selfishness, which was 
stamped especially by the most shameless service of 
mammon. Judas Iscariot had apparently taken the 
place of St. Peter. The same spirit which betrayed 
the Saviour of the world now betrayed the Christian 
church. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries 
the venality of the popes and their courts had 
become proverbial. "Dear lord and master," wrote 
the ambassador of the Teutonic order in the 
year 1420, to Prussia, " ye must send money ; for 
here at court all friendship's at an end when the 
money's spent." Again ; u Whoever w r ants any thing 



108 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

done here must first give money or money's worth, 
and lay it in the scales. I thought, when I left 
Prussia, that whoever could undauntedly speak the 
truth here must and ought to obtain his right; but 
without money, this will not be the case. It is the 
common way of the world here, — the more money, 
the better right. Greed is predominant at the court 
of Rome, and seeks, by new tricks and arts, to 
squeeze out day by day more money from Germany 
for the church fiefs ; and great outcries and complaints 
ensue, and a great dispute about the power of the 
Pope may be the result ; indeed, all obedience may be 
refused him, that all the money need no longer be 
carried away from us to the Italians : this last, I learn, 
would cause great satisfaction in many quarters." 
Thus we hear out of the mouth of a German, a hun- 
dred years before Luther, the anticipation of a future 
secession from Rome. " Do not fear excommunication 
so greatly," says another account from the same em- 
bassy, in 1429; "the devil is not so black as he is 
often painted, and excommunication is not so terrible 
as the Popes make it out to us. In Italy, even the 
lords and princes and cities, who are dependent on the 
Pope, do not fear unjust excommunication any longer; 
nor do they like the Pope much in Italy, only so far 
as he behaves well to them, and no further. We 
poor Germans alone still imagine him to be an earthly 
divinity : it were better we thought him an earthly 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



109 



devil, as he really and truly is !" . . . . " It had been 
better for me," exclaims another ambassador from 
Prussia, in 1447, in the most violent indignation, " that 
I had had my throat cut at Stargard when I was in 
danger of it, so had not come hither into all this 
misery and sorrow, nor witnessed all these sins." 

A state of corruption such as this could not have 
existed in the church of Rome, if it had not begun, 
like an infectious plague, among the highest princes 
of the church themselves. Every one knows the 
melancholy notoriety attained by individual popes in 
the fifteenth century. From John XXIII. (1400) to 
Alexander (1493 — 1502), a line of princes occupied the 
papal chair, who exhibited, with few exceptions, a 
frightful picture of the depravity of a hierarchical 
body, whose power could not be valid unless based on 
the confidence of nations in its moral worth. The 
popes of that period had passed through all the 
degrees of moral degeneration, — from weakness to 
duplicity, from vulgar cupidity to complete depravity. 
We do not intend to turn over again the impure 
pages of that history ; let it suffice to mention, that 
John XXIII. never entirely cleared himself of the 
accusation that he had poisoned his predecessor (Alex- 
ander V.), or that Innocent VIII. employed the ad- 
vantages of his position exclusively in providing for 
his seven children. Of his successor, Alexander VI., 
it would be better to be silent, rather than depict in 



110 



MARTIN LUTHER. AND THE 



its true colours the history of a life which fills us with 
horror, and is a disgrace to human nature. Indeed, 
through him and his children, the name of Borgia has 
been loaded with the execration of the world; and 
there is not an abyss of crime, however monstrous, 
into which he and his family did not fall. In our time 
it appears astounding, nay sacrilegious, that such 
depravity could ever exist, without the immediate 
downfall of the whole ecclesiastical edifice. Only 
those who can appreciate the power of habit, and the 
strength of old historical institutions, can find the 
solution of this apparent mystery. 

What has been said of the spiritual head may be 
applied, almost without reservation, to all the other 
members of the priesthood, the great majority of whom 
gave to the Christian world quite as offensive a spec- 
tacle as their high-priest at Rome. The reciprocal 
influence between the clergy and their spiritual prince 
was, indeed, unavoidable and continuous. An iEneas 
Sylvius (afterwards Pius II.) could in those days ob- 
serve facetiously, " that the sheep of Christ were now 
no longer tended, but only shorn." Perhaps he felt 
only half, or not at all, the bitter significance and the 
annihilating truth of his Italian epigram. 

The pious Abbot Ruisbrock, again, lamented that, 
"for a hundred wicked priests, scarcely one good one 
was to be found ; that popes, bishops, and priests bent 
their knees for the sake of temporal wealth; that 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



Ill 



visitations led to no improvements, but that every one 
concerned got that which he wanted : namely, the 
devil got the soul, the bishops the money, and the 
poor stupid human being momentary ease." 

" In my opinion," wrote an ambassador of the Teu- 
tonic order to his grand-master, "this only is clear, 
that the churches and clergy are too rich by far ; it is 
an evil that they have more than the holy Apostles 
had : things will not be better until that which kings 
and princes have given to the church in olden times, 
be taken away again from them." Thus early was an 
open free opinion given, that the riches of the church 
and the clergy were confided to them under certain 
moral conditions, and could therefore be reclaimed, to 
be used for a better purpose, as soon as those condi- 
tions ceased to be observed. 

Monachism offered a still stronger contrast to the 
ideal object of its founders ; and instead of practising 
self-denial, humility, and brotherly love, the monks 
gave themselves up to the enjoyment of worldly plea- 
sures, often in their coarsest forms. Convent life, as 
then understood, had become a mere living on the fat 
of the land in idleness and sensuality, mostly under 
the cloak of hypocrisy, but often even with shameless 
audacity. One of the most respected preachers at 
Strasburg (Geiler von Kaisersberg, 1478-1516) de- 
clares openly : " Convent life had become a mere 
mockery; convents and monasteries were houses of 



112 



M ARTIN 



LUTHER. 



A N D THE 



seduction; many a pious woman had entered a con- 
vent to her undoing. He does not hesitate to use the 
severe warning words: "When thou seest such a 
monk, then sign thyself with the cross : if he be black, 
then is he the devil ; if he be white, then is he the 
devil's mother; but if he be grey, then has he a share 
in both." This hard judgment of the stern German 
preacher agrees perfectly- well with the testimony of 
the Roman historian Infessura. As the contemporary 
of Alexander YL, he assures us, every one in Borne 
knows, alas, that monasteries have now become dens 
of moral corruption." 

So fearful and general a demoralisation of the clergy 
in all its degrees, would naturally produce the most 
lamentable reaction upon the laity. The same Geiler 
von Kaisersberg whom we have quoted above, calls 
the prelates, with unflinching severity, the cause and 
origin of the destruction of the whole earth. " They 
lead astray the poor little sheep (Schafldn) which 
follow them. Whoever trusts to this broken reed will 
fall. Only Christ, the apostles, and the other saints, 
are the true pillars on which we can lean." Wishing 
to point out the pernicious influence of the bad exam- 
ple set by the clergy, he illustrates it in his popular 
way, by referring to the story of the peasant who is 
climbing a high tree, having a chain of others hanging 
to his foot, each in turn grasping the foot of the one 
above him. All are thus safe, until the first, rubbing 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



113 



his hand in absence of mind, lets go his hold, and 
down they all tumble with himself. By this peasant 
(Geiler explains) he meant the prelate, who ought to 
attain the summit of the tree, L e. the height of Chris- 
tian life, and persuade his subordinates by an active 
example to follow him ; but as soon as he withdrew 
heart and hand from the tree of life, he became guilty 
of the moral apostasy of the whole nation clinging to 
him. 

The sight of this demoralisation among the spiritual 
teachers of the people, produced as a natural conse- 
quence, in the one case, a grievous want of faith ; in 
the other, the dullest superstition. Want of faith, 
among the better-educated, assumed the form of mere 
cold abstractions of the mind, or of a course of free, 
unbridled sensuality. Among such, it was said (by 
the father of Capito, e. g.) that only a fool or a hypo- 
crite could at that time become a priest. Superstition, 
again, was especially the lot of the poorer and less- 
educated classes. By means of absurd preaching, false 
miracles, by a repulsive traffic in relics, and by the 
establishment of many additional shrines, they were 
continually taxed and plundered. Both these spiritual 
perversions — want of faith, and superstition — tended^ 
with equal impetus, to utter demoralisation ; which in- 
creased so frightfully, year after year, as to call forth the 
bitterest and most despairing laments from the few noble- 
minded men of the period. Geiler, who often consoled 
8 



114 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



himself, as well as others, with the hope that " G od would 
soon send a man for the renovation of their corrupted 
religion," had at other times to struggle against entire 
hopelessness : " Thou sayest, Can we not cause a 
general reformation ? I say, no ; there is no hope of 
amendment in Christendom !" What wonder, there- 
fore, that, as ever happens at the threshold of great 
revolutions, many serious minds became possessed 
with the idea that the end of the world and the last 
judgment were approaching; or that others expected 
a second deluge ? 

An opposition to this corruption in the dominant 
church — ever becoming more and more manifest — had 
arisen in men's minds for centuries, which in many 
directions amounted not only to a complete rupture 
with the existing visible church, faithless to its ori- 
ginal vocation, but fell gradually into contradiction to 
the fundamental ideas of Christian revelation. 

The violent desire to throw off all ecclesiastical 
authority, and to break through all religious restric- 
tions, took refuge in Pantheism. Only bej^ond the 
reach of hierarchical despotism, and the sphere of his- 
torical revelation, did men hope to find freedom in 
those ideas which represent man as divine by nature, 
not requiring revelation or atonement. By this means 
the whole historical foundation upon which not only 
the church of Rome, but all Christianity as a church, 
had built itself, was overleapt at a bound. This was 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



115 



the doctrine professed at a later period by the Beg- 
hards* and the Brethren of the Free Spirit, in their 
secret meetings. Its practical application appeared 
in an endeavour to re-establish the original nature of 
man, his first innocence in paradise, and the uncondi- 
tional equality of all, through the abolition of all 
distinctions ; all the divisions among men, through 
family, property, community, or church, were to be 
lost in the divine unity of his original nature. Man 
needed only to understand and give an unquestioned 
course of action to his inborn divine nature, and the 
freedom, innocence, and equality of paradise would 
reappear of themselves. To use a modern expression, 
we may say that this movement showed unmistakably 
the pantheistic communism of the close of the middle 
ages. 

Its principal seat in Germany was Cologne, where 
also Master Eccard (who held similar religious, if not 
moral views) taught. Here the secret meetings were 
held, and the immoral practices carried on, which 
would not be hidden even in the darkest retreats, and 
were at length (1325)fully traced and capitally punished. 

* A number of artisans at Antwerp united in 1228, under this 
name, in the performance of certain religious exercises, conforming 
to the rule of St. Beggha, the mother of Pepin of Heristal. At 
the end of the thirteenth century they subjected themselves to the 
order of St. Francis, and at a later period became regular monks. 
They were exposed to many cruel persecutions, and but few of their 
monasteries existed in the beginning of the eighteenth century. 



116 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



From that time, the Brethren of the Free Spirit, 
wherever they might be found — on the Rhine, the 
Site, or the Baltic — were exposed to the severest per- 
secutions of the church. This doctrine has since been 
maintained in several periods — during the Reforma- 
tion, in the last century, and in our own time, — -and 
has always exhibited the same fundamental character: 
a complete denial of the profoundest laws of indivi- 
duality, human and divine; and, nearly connected 
with this, the rudest denial of the most simple and 
indispensable conditions of human society and civili- 
sation ; a denial of the freedom of thought and of 
legitimate love. 

The Brethren of the Free Spirit strove, unsuccess- 
fully and in an eccentric manner, for the radical reform 
of the church and of social order. There arose at 
the same time, and also later, a much stronger and 
more widely-spread party, which cautiously led the 
attack against existing abuses within the limits of 
history, on a common Christian and ecclesiastical 
ground. The principal objects of this party were re- 
forms in the constitution and discipline of the church ; 
the remedy was therefore to be sought principally in 
the amendment and progress of forms and institutions. 
The unlimited monarchical power in the church had 
destroyed itself so completely through schism (the 
co-existence and mutual quarrels of several popes), 
;hat the question concerning the legitimate origin of 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 117 



its supremacy forced itself naturally upon the minds 
of men. " Not in the pope alone/' they said, " but in 
the bishops, the clerical councils, with or without the 
pope, was the true source of spiritual power, of eccle- 
siastical sovereignty, to be found." In other words 
the church aristocracy placed itself beside the sove- 
reign of the church, and in decisive moments even 
above him ; placing the highest law-giving and judicial 
authority in a vicarious assembly of all Christian 
nations. 

Out of this spirit arose, in the first half of the 
fifteenth century, the great councils of Pisa, Con- 
stance, and Basle, from which Europe expected the 
ultimate accomplishment of long-cherished wishes : a 
reformation of the head and the members ; the rooting 
out of crying abuses in the government and adminis- 
tration of the church. Minds were not lacking which 
conceived and occasionally gave utterance to the plan 
of a comprehensive reformation ; neither was courage 
wanting boldly to assert the extraordinary power 
which the voice of nations had granted. Popes were 
appointed and deposed with undoubting confidence, 
almost like presidents of an ecclesiastical republic; 
and the fundamental idea of a permanent representa- 
tive constitution, rightfully established, was solemnly 
carried out. 

And yet the efforts of these different bodies of men, 
although supported by the spirit of the time and by 



118 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



the voice of the whole Christian civilised world, were 
fruitless. The reformation from above, longed for 
and resolved upon, was shipwrecked, partly upon the 
inevitable contradictions of this representative govern- 
ment without any firmly established organisation, 
partly upon the resistance and the cunning policy of 
the papal court, and partly upon the folly of the poli- 
tical powers, and the caprice of the people. A half- 
century of the most strenuous exertions, of the most 
hopeful beginnings, was apparently to end in exhaus- 
tion and indifference. 

At that time the way of salvation had been secured 
from another side ; not through disputes about the 
constitution and the doubtful boundaries of power 
between the prince of the church and his ecclesiastical 
parliament, nor by means of the privileged higher 
classes and ranks of the clergy, but through indivi- 
duals distinguished by their power of persuasion. 
With the irresistible power of the inspired word, they 
addressed all Christians, without any distinction of 
rank or calling — laymen and clergymen, learned and 
unlearned. A severe moral life, and the simplifying 
of the external church according to the rule of the 
oldest Christian community and of the Scriptures, 
were the two levers with which they hoped to raise 
Christianity to a state of purity and renovation. 

Men like Wickliffe at Oxford, Huss and Jerome at 
Prague, John von Wesel at Erfurt and on the Khine 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



119 



(at Mayence and Worms), and Savonarola at Florence, 
were the most important leaders of this movement. 
Almost all of them were martyrs to their cause; the 
English Wickliffe alone died (1384) unmolested in his 
village cure, although the English hierarchy, at their 
council in London, had condemned his doctrine and 
banished him from the university. Huss and Jerome 
of Prague suffered a martyr's death in the beginning 
of the century, as Savonarola at its end, — the two 
former on the banks of the Rhine, the other on that 
of the Arno ; and John von Wesel died a bowed-down 
old man in a convent prison. The papal and the re- 
presentative ecclesiastical powers, the court of Rome 
and the council of Constance, were agreed in their 
persecution and condemnation. But through these 
sacrifices a flame was kindled which no temporal 
power could quench ; the resistance to the corruptions 
in the church had found a firm and immovable founda- 
tion in the authority of the Scriptures as the original 
record of revelation, also in the undying icord and 
blood of the martyred witnesses to the truth. This, 
however, is at all times the mysterious ever-flowing 
source of every great advance in history : faith and 
sacrifice in inseparable union ; the divine certainty of 
conviction, and the sealing it as a faithful sacrifice 
unto death ; the glorifying of thought and of suffering 
in eternal love. 

Hitherto we have spoken of the great attempts at 



120 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

reformation in the fifteenth century to be obtained, 
here by anorganic reform of ecclesiastical institutions, 
there through individuals distinguished in the work 
of reformation ; while throughout all a practical re- 
form of external clerical life, its constitution, morals, 
and manners, was chiefly the object. Now, however, 
we turn to quieter efforts for obtaining reform, which 
kept in view less an external than, in the first instance, 
an internal spiritual reform. In the one case (although 
the two cannot well be completely separated), the new 
birth of forms and of external practice was striven 
for; in the other case, on the contrary, the regenera- 
tion of the spirit, heart, and mind was first and prin- 
cipally asserted : in the one case a practical, in the 
other a theoretical reform predominated. The most 
important testimony to the origin and internal neces- 
sity of these endeavours is, that the reform movements 
in both the above directions took place almost contem- 
poraneously and with equal power; for only those 
reforms on a larger scale bear within them the vitality 
which outlives, which are deep and rich enough to 
attract the two opposite poles of human knowledge, 
1 the spiritual and the temporal, and thus satisfactorily 
meet the wants of an active as well as a reflective 
spirit. 

The more internal efforts at reformation had their 
deepest foundation in two of the most important spiri- 
tual events of the fifteenth century. The true spirit 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



121 



of Christianity, liberated from its disfigurement and 
disguise, from its fetters and materialisation, was 
recognised and estimated at its real value, in its ori- 
ginal truth and freedom ; but this liberation had been 
rendered possible only through the greater jpoiver ob- 
tained by the spirit of religion, and by a more vivid 
comprehension of the original history of Christianity. 
This greater power of the spirit of religion, and this 
more liberal comprehension of history, must be looked 
upon as the two most powerful springs of the spiritual 
reforms before Luther. From the depths of this reli- 
gious feeling, and the moral consciousness inspired by 
it, as well as from the oldest written documents dating 
from the establishment of the first church, the Chris- 
tian spirit drew the means for its renovation, and the 
church for its second birth; and never have historical 
knowledge and religious inspiration united in a nobler 
labour — never have knowledge and faith formed a 
more beautiful union — than in this dawn of the 
Reformation. 

The historical comprehension of primitive Chris- 
tianity received, through the happy junction of favour- 
able circumstances, an impetus such as had hitherto 
been unheard-of and impossible. The revived study 
of ancient languages, and of classical as well as 
biblical antiquity generally, furnished the necessary 
key to the comprehension of the biblical records in 
the original tongues ; and the newly-invented art of 



122 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



printing served to spread them abroad. A more rapid 
circulation, and an easier comprehension, went thus 
hand in hand. It is well known how much Germany 
owes on this point to men like Agricola, Reuchlin, 
and Erasmus. 

These endeavours after mere language and forms, 
although of incalculable importance and influence, 
would not in themselves have opened the very heart 
of biblical antiquity, or of the original spirit of Chris- 
tianity, if the liveliest susceptibility for the mysteries 
of spiritual life and of religious feeling, had not been 
gradually awakened in another direction. 

This last task was accomplished by a body of men 
who are ordinarily called the advocates of German 
mysticism before the Reformation. It is not a light 
undertaking, in these days of Babylonian confusion 
of tongues and ideas, to uphold this innocent expres- 
sion in its original historical sense, against the most 
diversified misconstructions. In that free, plain signi- 
fication, mysticism is nothing but the religion of the 
heart and of feeling, as distinguished from that other 
religious sentiment which is founded, in sober cool 
natures, more exclusively upon moral perception; in 
more practical natures, again, upon common sense and 
reflection. Only he who is capable of distinguishing 
the subtle essence of religion from reflective thought, 
or active morality, can conceive that peculiar state of 
the mind which, in history and philosophy, is denomi 



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123 



nated mysticism. It is the fulness of spiritual life, 
which, turning to the eternal origin of all things, 
derives its sustenance from the pure hidden sources 
of the soul. This religion of the heart, which, as a 
clear expression less likely to be misapprehended, we 
may denominate mysticism, rises in poetical natures 
on the wings of the imagination ; while it prevails, in 
minds pre-eminently moral and tenderly attuned, like 
a warm breath of feeling, as a gentle comprehension 
of the entire life of the soul. 

The German Christian mysticism of the fourteenth 
and fifteenth centuries appears, on a more general 
review, as the first important step towards the Refor- 
mation, — a first grand effort for the spiritual re-esta- 
blishment of Christianity. It is, indeed, the natural 
soil for the growth of religious freedom and profound 
depth of feeling which obtained at the period of the 
Reformation ; and for a long space of time Luther 
himself is essentially indebted to it for intellectual 
nourishment and growth. It insists, on all occasions 
and with great emphasis, upon individual experience, 
and the life of religion in the heart ; it seeks in the 
innermost depth of the soul, and by the sacrifice of 
an active and devoted love, an immediate union with 
the Supreme -Being, immaterial and essential. 

Among the most important and influential German 
advocates of this movement before the Reformation, 
are Suso and Tauler (the author of The German 



124 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



Theology) in the fourteenth, and Thomas a Kempis in 
the fifteenth century. The first two drew from the 
fulness of a spiritual life, rich in experience, such a 
power of living words, that they influenced men's 
minds at great distances, and produced a deep impres- 
sion particularly in the cities on the Rhine, the prin- 
cipal scene of their labours, and awakened in num- 
berless individuals a desire for higher attainments. 
Suso (1300-1365) relates most gracefully, in his 
poetical style, " how he had a great desire to become 
and be called the servant of eternal wisdom; and how, 
whenever he heard songs or words of temporal lore, or 
hymns of praise and sweet music, his heart and wishes 
were bent upon i his loveliest love, from whom all love 
flows.' He thought : 4 God ! if I could only once see 
my beloved, only once get speech of Him !' While he 
thus strove how far he might see Him with his spiritual 
eyes in the express declarations of Scripture, He manifested 
Himself to him, shining like the morning star, and like 
the glittering beams of the rising sun. His crown was 

CO o 

eternity, his garment bliss, his word sweetness, his 
embrace the fulness of joy; He was present yet 
hidden, reaching above the highest heavens, and 
touching the lowest depths. Pie bent down to him 
lovingly, and spoke kindly : ' My son, give me thy 
heart.' Ah, heart mine, see whence floweth love and 
all kindliness; whence cometh all tenderness, beauty, 
heart-enjoyment, and loveliness. Cometh it not from 



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125 



the ever-flowing fountain-head of the Divinity itself? 
Plunge then my heart and mind and courage into the 
abyss of all good things ! . . . . Thus was his soul im- 
pressed with the original emanation of all good, in 
which he spiritually found all that is worthy of love 
and desire. Then he often felt like a babe held by 
its mother on her knee, her hands under its arms, 
striving to reach that tender mother by the motions 
of its head and body, and testifying its heartfelt joy 
by its pretty movements : thus his heart often rose to 
the blissful presence of eternal Wisdom." 

Never before Luther was this heart felt apprehension 
of the Deity expressed in the German tongue more 
feelingly, more gracefully, or with greater poetical 
beauty, than in these words of Suso ; the warm longing 
after the substance, not the mere shadow of religion. 
That which the greatest German poet of modern 
times meant to express in the celebrated words : 

a Man sehnt sich nach des Lebens Bachen; 
Ach ! nach des Lebens Quelle hin !"* 

had previously found the simplest and purest utterance 
in the mouth of the pious Suabian poet of the four- 
teenth century. 

From a mind like Suso's we may justly expect the 
whole poetical depth of a religious nature. He praises 



We languish for the streams of life; 

Ah! for life's source itself!''' Goethe s Faust. 



126 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

the " intelligent Aristotle, the virtuous heathen 
master," for having found evidence in the well-ordered 
course of nature of the existence of ' ■ one only Lord 
and Master of all creatures, whom we call God." 

" Mortal eye," says Suso, " cannot see him ; but he 
may be seen in his works, for his creatures are like a 
mirror in which God is reflected ; and this recognition 
we call, therefore, a reflecting or mirroring. So let 
us reflect upon the great high Master in his works. 
Look above, and around to all the four quarters of the 
world ; — how vast, how sublime the heavens in their 
swift course ! How nobly the Lord has adorned it 
with planets, and decked it with the countless number 
of bright stars ! Oh ! when the beauteous sun arises 
cheeringly, unclouded, in the summer-time, how bene- 
ficently it then bestows upon the earth fruits and all 
other good things ! How leaf and herb spring forth ! 
how the lovely flowers smile ! how wood and heath 
and meadow resound with the sweet songs of the 
nightingales and little birds ! how all the animals, 
shut up during the severe winter, rejoice in their re- 
lease ! how all humanity, } 7 oung and old, frolic joy- 
fully with rapturous delight! Ah, gracious God! if 
thou be so lovely in thy creatures, how entirely beau- 
tiful and delightful art thou in thyself! All cry, 
Praise and glory to thee, Lord ! fathomless and im- 
measurable." " Now hast thou found thy God, 

whom thy heart has long sought. Now look upwards, 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



127 



with glistening eyes, with bright countenance and 
bounding heart, and view him, the great King of all 
creatures. See, such reflections soon lead a feeling 
human being to rejoice ; and this rejoicing is a delight 
which no tongue can express, but which powerfully 
fills heart and soul." 

In abstruse minds, such as Suso's, the religion of 
the heart appears, if we may express it thus, personal, 
and influences, with quiet but irresistible power, all 
susceptible minds that come within its range. We 
have a portraiture of his mind in his own words : 
"I was called the faithful father of the poor; I 
was the particular friend of all that loved God ; all 
that came to me weary and heavy-laden ever found 
counsel, so that they parted from me cheered and 
comforted : for I wept with those that were weeping, 
and mourned with the mourners, until I had consoled 
them as a mother would her child. If a man wronged 
me ever so grievously, and only smiled on me kindly 
afterwards, I was ready to forgive him in God's name, 
and to forget the offence as if it never had been. 
Even the wants and sufferings of the little birds and 
animals, or of any of God's creatures, went to my 
heart ; and I prayed to the pitiful Lord on high that 
he would help them. 5 ' 

This mildness and loving warmth of his whole 
character could not, however, prevent his being treated 
by worldly and hard-hearted persons as a strange nay 



12S 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



a hateful phenomenon : " he converted men/' so they 
reproached him, with violent threats, " into a peculiar 
eccentric mode of life termed spiritual (der Geist) ; and 
those belonging to this class, spiritualists (Geister unci 
Geisterinnen) , the most perverse set that ever lived 
upon earth." But all this vanished before the powel* 
of his life and his preaching. His sermons were often 
so affecting, that his face appeared to his hearers, as 
one of them assures us, surrounded by a halo. "Mark 
ye," so he cried sometimes, at particularly striking 
passages, in moments of enthusiasm, " the blusterer 
will bluster."* 

The greater power of the living and spoken word, 
as compared with the written word, he points out in 
a beautiful passage, quite characteristic of himself: 
" The difference is as great between a sweet musical 
instrument played upon, and hearing it only talked 
about ; so unlike are the words conceived in pure grace 
flowing from a living heart through a living mouth, 
to the same words written upon lifeless parchment, 
particularly in the vulgar tongue : in the latter case 
they become cold and weak, as a plucked rose fades 
and withers ; for the unction which touches the human 
soul dies away then, and the words fall upon the 
stony ground of a hard heart. Never sounded chord 
so sweetly, but is silenced if strung upon a dry 
board." 



* Der Seuss will saussen ; a play on the word Suso, Seuss, i. e. 
der Sausende, the blusterer. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



129 



The degree in which Tauler had influenced Luther 
is proved by the words of the latter to Spalatin 
(1516) : u If thou takest pleasure in becoming ac- 
quainted with the true doctrine as it was received in 
olden times in the German tongue, buy Dr. John 
Tauler's sermons. I have never met, either in German 
or Latin, with a sounder theology, and which agreed 
more completely with the Gospel. Taste and see how 
good is the Lord; if thou hast already tasted and 
seen how bitter all that is that w T e ourselves are." 
" Although," he says in another place, " unknown to 
the divines of the schools, I know that Tauler gives 
us more pure doctrine than all the books of the 
teachers at the universities." 

Tauler (died 1361) knew perhaps in a yet higher 
degree than Suso how T to move the hearts of the peo- 
ple through his powerful preaching in the German 
language; his words frequently struck his hearers like 
lightning, and, overpowered by emotion, they fell 
fainting to the ground. " Imitation of our Lord 
Jesus Christ" was the key-note of his doctrine, and 
gave colour to his life. Therefore did the salvation 
and consolation of individuals outweigh with him the 
consideration for the self-seeking commands of his 
ecclesiastical superiors ; his heart revolted against 
allowing the innocent people to die without the conso- 
lations of religion on account of papal excommunica- 
tion. Consequently he taught them to distinguish 
9 



130 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



between papal and divine commands : " All those who 
hold the true Christian faith, and sin only against the 
person of the pope, are not heretics ; but those are who 
obstinately act contrary to God's word, and will not 
amend their ways." Tauler and his friends, the Car- 
thusian priest Ludolph, and Thomas, the vicar-general 
of the Augustins at Strasburg, taught " that the word 
of Christ and of the Apostles was more important 
than papal excommunication, which was fulminated 
in worldly passion only." 

" We succeeded so far," relates his contemporary 
Specklin, u that the people died in peace, and did not 
any longer fear excommunication so greatly, while 
formerly many thousands died without confession, in 

great despair He (Tauler) published many 

consolatory tracts to be read to the common people in 
their last moments, at the administration of the sacra- 
ments ; by which means many priests were rendered 
truly pious." 

From Tauler's connexion also issued a pamphlet in 
which the relation between church and state was con- 
sidered, in a sense fundamentally opposed to the 
strictly papal system which had been maintained 
hitherto. It said, " There are two kinds of swords, 
the one spiritual, which is the word of God, the other 
temporal authority; one independent of the other. 
But as both are of God, they cannot be opposed to 
each other. The spiritual sword acts as the word of 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



131 



God; it defends God's ordinances and people, and 
punishes evil-doers. If temporal authority were to 
be condemned by spiritual authority, God would con- 
demn his own work. But when a temporal chief 
sins, it behoves the spiritual authority to lead the 
sinner into the right way, in great humility and with 
unceasing intercession. There is no evidence in the 
word of God that all must be heretics who will not 
kiss the pope's feet, or that this is an article of faith. 
To the emperor, as the highest authority, obedience 
before all others is due ; if he does not govern justly, 
he must render an account of it to God, and not to 
poor sinful men. Whoever, therefore, is unjustly ex- 
communicated, his condemnation becomes pardon 

before God The soul belongs to God ; body and 

goods to the emperor." 

We see thus, that from this mystical and purely 
spiritual movement there sprung a resistance to the 
church, become utterly worldly and formal; — resis- 
tance founded upon a higher principle and daily ex- 
perience. It was a higher principle to appeal to 
Christ, to the apostles, the Scriptures, the councils, 
against the ordinances of the pope, the highest 
priestly authority ; or to appeal to the religious as well 
as moral power of the state against clerical arrogance. 
These were precisely the pillars on which Luther's 
edifice was to be erected. 

The above-mentioned resistance was founded, we 



132 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

say, also upon daily experience — upon the revolting 
spectacle of corruption in the church of the priests; a 
spectacle which provoked even patient, self-collected 
souls to expressions of severe condemnation. The 
important little book, Of the Nine Rocks {von den 
neun Felsen), which perhaps originated with Suso, a 
book intended to teach inquiring souls who wish to 
turn to God the true way to find him, gives a revolt- 
ing picture of the corrupt state of Christendom. It 
describes "how sadly it fared with all men, only a 
few excepted, and how all Christian order had 

vanished or been perverted Formerly the 

popes had been seriously anxious for the well-being 
of Christendom ; but now the light of just government 
had been extinguished in them, as they sought only 
their own honour and worldly advantage. The car- 
dinals strove only to procure worldly honours for their 
relations, or themselves to become popes ; the bishops 
loved and cared for riches, honours, and worldly 
power, more than for the souls for whom God had 
given his blood. There were no professors who dared 
speak the truth from their chairs to warn the people, 
at the risk of their lives. The secular clergy wasted 
the wealth which had been intrusted to them for re 
ligious purposes, in incontinence, gormandising, aofl 
vain-glory ; all seriousness was extinct and forgottei ; 
they had fallen into a state of complete indifference. 
In the monasteries nothing but warfare and ajnten- 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 133 

tioii for power were met with. Among the mendicant 
friars it was rare to find one confessor who did not 
seek his own advantage in flattering the people. In 
convents matters had gone so far, that if one true 
Christian was found in them, he was obliged to leave 
on account of the language and wicked lives of the 
inmates. They derided, and even sought to destroy, 
any one really converted to eternal truth." 

When the author of the little book, Of the Nine 
Rocks, considers afterwards the conduct of the laity, 
he finds the same faults : among the princes and 
nobility, pride, wantonness, arrogance, and oppression ; 
among citizens and merchants, avarice, and an inces- 
sant restless desire for gain ; each wanted to become 
equal or superior to the other in riches, instead of 
being satisfied with the needful for themselves and 
their children. Of the artisans he complains, that 
" in their pride they seek to climb high above their 
station, and to place themselves on an equality with 
those below whom they were stationed according to 
the laws of God." The peasants he calls ignorant of 
all godliness, wicked and naughty, of a thoroughly 
bad heart and mind. " Among women all chastity 
and feminine modesty had vanished, so that they were 
more eager and bold for sin than the men." 

It is no wonder that such observations should 
waken in the mind of this man also the thought of 
approaching destruction, or of an impending brutish 



134 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



barbarism. " If God meant to destroy the world for 
its sins as in the time of Noah, he must do it every 
hour and every day !" 

As tokens of such judgments appeared to him the 
heavy afflictions which befell Europe somewhat more 
than five hundred years ago (1347-1348), the destruc- 
tive war between church and state, and the fearful 
disease called the black sickness (schtoartzer Tod), 
which carried off thousands. " God hath kindly and 
lovingly warned the people in these latter times ; but 
it was of no use, and he has been forgotten." He 
fears, therefore, that God would permit that one should 
murder the other, in a state of general barbarism ; 
for already one wanted to rise above the other; sin 
was no longer looked upon as sin ; indeed, for centuries 
past such wickedness had not been equalled. Tauler 
also joins him in troubled warnings : "Ye people all, 
observe seriously and mark with trembling fear the 
great wrath and the long-merited plagues of God's 
justice, which fall heavily upon the world in these 
days, more heavily indeed than for the last four cen- 
turies. And it is much to be feared that they will 
become inconceivably more overpowering and heavy." 

Among the important advocates of this mystical 
party are mentioned, besides Suso and Tauler, the 
author of German Divinity, and Thomas a Kempis. 

The little work, German Divinity, must be looked 
upon indisputably as one of the most remarkable 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



135 



spiritual preparations for the Keformation ; as such it 
produced upon the mind of Luther the very deepest 
impression. u We read," he writes in his preface to 
the above work, which he republished in 1518, "that 
St. Paul, of weak and contemptible bodily presence, 
wrote yet weighty and powerful letters, and boasts 
that he came not with excellence of speech and en- 
ticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration 
of the spirit and of power. Also, when one observes 
the Avoids of the Lord, it is clear that fine and showy 
preacher* are not always chosen to preach his word ; 
but it is written: 'Out of the mouths of babes and 
sucklings thou hast perfected thy praise.' 

" Therefore I say, that I mean to warn every one 
who readeth this little book, that he may not cause 
himself an injury by being offended at its bad German 
and simple style. For this excellent little book, poor 
and unadorned as it is in words and human wisdom, 
is nevertheless rich and precious in knowledge and 
divine wisdom. And I speak foolishly, but I must 
say, that I have not met with any book, except the 
Bible and St. Augustin, from which I have learnt and 
shall learn more of the nature of God, Christ, man- 
kind, and all things. Now I perceive, for the first 
time, that what several very learned men accuse us 
Wittenberg theologians of, is true, namely, that we 
wish to introduce new things, saying people with such 
sentiments had never before existed any where. Yea, 



136 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



verily there have been such, but the wrath of God 
incurred by our sins has not deemed us worthy either 
to hear or see them ; for it is now clear as day, that 
in the universities nothing of this kind has been 
done, and that consequently God's holy word has not 
only been thrown aside under the bench, but almost 
consumed by dust and moths. 

" Let who will read this book, and then say whether 
our theology is new or old; for assuredly this book is 
not new. It may be said, perhaps, that we are 
German divines. Let it be so; I thank God that I 
have met with my God as I and those with me have 
never before met with him, either in Latin, Greek, or 
Hebrew. God grant that this book may become 
better known; then it will be found that the German 
theologians are the best divines. Amen." 

In old editions we find the author thus alluded to : 
" The almighty and everlasting God inspired a wise, 
intelligent, truthful, and upright man, his faithful 
friend a German gentleman, a priest and custos in the 
house of the Teutonic Knights at Frankfort, to write 
this little book, which teaches many a beautiful dis- 
tinction in divine truth, and particularly how to re- 
cognise the true and faithful friend of God, and also 
the unjust, false, and faithless spirits hurtful to holy 
church.'' 

We see that Luther greets this little piece of Ger- 
man divinity as one of the purest utterances of 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



137 



Christian truth, as a source of knowledge which, after 
the Bible and St. Augustin, enlightened him most on 
divine subjects. This remarkable work is indeed as 
pure an attempt as it is bold and profound to deliver 
Christianity from torpid forms, and revive its spiritual 
and emotional character. The earnest religious ten- 
dency of the German mind thus rid itself gently but 
firmly from the shackles which had hitherto impeded 
its progress in divine life and knowledge. The spiri- 
tual Christianity of the Saviour of the world rises 
thus from the infant condition of a fettered and mere 
formal creed, from the fantastic legends of saints and 
blind obedience to the dead letter of the law, to a free 
and inward religion; the religion of the divine Naza- 
rene returns to its true sanctuary, the conscience and 
the heart. 

This is the chief import of German Divinity, and 
on this account only could it occupy so important a 
place in the history of the development of the German 
reformer. It repeatedly and plainly insists upon the 
fundamental character it assigns to inward religious 
experience and practice, and to individual faith : 
'•'When that which is perfect is come, that which is 
imperfect shall be done away. But when will it 
come? I say, ivhen it is hnoivn, felt, and tasted in the 
soul, as far as that is possible to a created being." 
And still more evidently in contrast to a dead histo- 
rical faith ; " Also all the works and miracles which 



138 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

God hath ever wrought or may ever work in and 
through all creatures, or God himself in all his good- 
ness, as far as it is and takes 'place without me, does not 
make me blessed ; but only as it is and happens within 
me, and is known and loved, felt and tasted by me." 
Sin and redemption, the history of Adam and Christ, 
the fall and the regeneration of the divine image in 
human nature, are set forth as the consecutive spiri- 
tual history of the human race : " Scripture, faith, 
,and truth say sin is nothing but the turning away of 
the creature from immutable good to the mutable, 
from perfection to imperfection, and in most cases to 

itself. My fallen state must be restored in the 

same way as Adam's, and by the same means. God 
took upon himself human nature and became man, 
and man became a partaker of the divine nature. 
Thus is our regeneration secured; and if I am to be 
restored from my fall, then the God in me must be- 
come man in me. God may take to himself all that 
is so in me from within and without, so that nothing 
may be w r ithin me which resists God or hinders his 
word in me. 

" In justice and in truth, man ought to lay claim to 
nothing, love nothing, or think of nothing, except 
God, and him alone, i. e. the eternal and sole-perfect 
Good. In a word, if a man can be towards God what 
his hand is to himself, he may rest content. This 
end we can attain only by degrees, as we gradually 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



139 



ascend from the knowledge and love of the noblest 
and purest of creatures to the Creator in his perfection. 
If, then, among created beings, we attach ourselves to 
the best we can discern, we attain higher and yet 
higher grades, until we understand and perceive that 
the eternal and sole-perfect is immeasuraby above all 
created good. 

" There is but one way to this elevation of spiritual 
life in God, — communion with Christ. Whoever does 
not reach that highest truth by the right way or the 
right door, that is to say, through Christ, or who 
fancies he has attained it without him, will sink into 

mad license and carelessness Neither by much 

inquiry, nor hearsay, nor by reading and study, nor 
by profound science, nor the learning of professors, 
nor great natural gifts of reason, can we attain true 
knowledge or the life in Christ. . . . Christ himself 
bears witness to this ; he says : ' Whosoever will come 
after me, let him take up his cross and follow me.' 
Here he means to say : ' Whoever will not forsake 
and lose all things, can never truly know me nor 
attain to my life.' 

And if the mouth of man had never spoken it, 

yet truth did it of itself, for it is so in truth 

No one can be enlightened, unless he be previously 
purified, cleansed, and freed ; neither can any one be 
in communion with God, unless enlightened. There 
are thus three ways, — purification, enlightenment, 
communion. 



140 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

" If we speak of the old and the new man, it is to 
be understood that the old man is Adam, and disobe- 
dience, selfishness, and egotism ; but the new man is 
Christ and obedience. . . . For true obedience man 

was and is created, and owes it to God ; and this obe- 
dience died and was lost in Adam, but arose again in 
Christ. . . . . . Indeed the human nature of Christ 

stands alone, apart from itself and from all things, as 
no other creature, and was no other than a tabernacle 
and habitation of God and of all that belongs to 
God. ..... Whoever lives in obedience and in the 

new man, is the brother of Christ and the child of 

God Whoever lives in disobedience lives in 

sin, and sin is never repented of nor forsaken but by 
returning to obedience; and if man return to true 
obedience, then he is penitent and forgiven. And if 
the devil could attain true faith, he would become an 
angel, and all his sin and wickedness would be for- 
given at once If it were possible for a man 

to be so wholly pure, free from self and from all 
things in the true obedience, as Christ was in his 
humanity, that man would be without sin, and also 
united in Christ, and he would be that by grace which 
Christ was by nature. But it is said, that cannot be; 
yet it is possible for man to approach a divine state 

and to be called godly Whoever knoweth and 

understandeth the life of Christ, knoweth and under- 
standeth also Christ himself; and as much of the life 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 141 

of Christ as exists in man, as much is Christ in him ; 
and as little as there is of the one, so little is there 

of the other Mark, one word or two ; embrace 

all this which otherwise must be expressed in many 
words : be pure, and wholly free of self." 

It was necessary, for our object, to refer thus largely 
to these and other fundamental ideas of the work en- 
titled German Divinity, because one of the most im- 
portant elements of the culture of our reformer was 
involved in it. 

In conclusion, we have yet to mention, among the 
German co-operators in the Reformation before 
Luther, the author of The Imitation of Christ {Nacli- 
folge Christi), Thomas a Kempis (1380-1471), who 
died twelve years before Luther's birth. The history 
of his mental progress and influence point in their 
origin to Ruisbrock (1293-1381), in their effects to 
Wessel, and through him to Luther. 

John Ruisbrock lived in the forest solitude of his 
monastery at Gruenthal, near Brussels, in deep con- 
templation and exalted thought. He was visited 
there by two men, each of whom became afterwards 
a spiritual salt for his respective country, — Tauler for 
Germany, and Groot for the Netherlands. The minds 
of both were deeply affected by their intercourse with 
the venerable Christian seer, which aided in giving the 
decisive colouring to their future proceedings. 

Gerard Groot, a native of Deventer (1340-1384), 



.142 



MARTIN LUTHER , AND THE 



became known in his own country as an honest, 
powerful, and affecting preacher to the people, and 
also as a zealous reformer of morals ; but when the 
solemnity of his addresses to the people became 
obnoxious to a large, corrupt portion of the clergy, he 
obeyed the orders of his ecclesiastical superiors, and 
withdrew r to a more private and circumscribed sphere 
of action. But even here he was destined to be of 
the greatest importance, not only to his country, but 
to humanity. In his retirement he founded the Com- 
munist Brethren (Briider vom gemeinsamen Leben,); 
those Christian unions and establishments which ex- 
ercised, during the century before the Reformation, 
the most beneficial and extensive influence over the 
religious education and spiritual awakening of the 
people in the Netherlands and in Germany. 

The idea of establishing a society for true Christian 
communion and brotherhood in his native city was 
first conceived by him during his visit to Ruisbrock 
in the monastery at Gruenthal (1378), on witnessing 
the beautiful united and brotherly life of the canons 
there. The work begun by Groot received the neces- 
sary completion and extension through his pupil and 
successor, Floren + ius Radewin (1350-1400) ; and 
under the direction of this man, young Thomas k 
Kemp is was educated and fitted for his future task as 
the spiritual teacher of thousands, — so little dreamt 
of by him in his humility. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



143 



We have no traces, it is true, of any immediate 
important influence exercised by the writings of 
Thomas a Kempis upon Luther ; but it may be traced 
through the man who must be accepted as the spiri- 
tual connection and mental point of junction between 
Thomas a Kempis and Luther,— John Wessel (1419- 
1489), the greatest German theologian among the 
advocates of the Reformation of the fifteenth century. 
Wessel had received his „early education, and become 
acquainted with the grey-haired Thomas a Kempis, 
who lived in the monastery of St. Agnes, at the 
neighbouring house of the Communist Brethren at 
Zwoll. The little work, The Imitation of Christ, which 
Kempis was then engaged in writing, became to him, 
Wessel himself states, the powerful incitement to 
piety, and a foundation of sound divinity. This true 
religion of the heart, this love without selfishness, 
nourished in the young Wessel the warmth indispens- 
able to the fulfilment of that task which eventually 
made him the German reformer of the fifteenth cen- 
tury, the spiritual precursor and theological brother 
in the faith of Luther. Luther speaks of him with 
unequivocal admiration (1522): "Wessel now also 
comes to light as a man of great intellect and lofty 
mind, such as is not often found ; and it may be seen 
that he is really taught by God, as Isaiah had prophe- 
sied of such Christians. For it cannot be said that 
he derives his doctrine from man, any more than I do. 



144 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

If I had read Wessel's work earlier, rav enemies 
might think that I had taken all my doctrine from 
him, so well dp our spirits agree. This causes me 
great joy and increased strength ; and I doubt no 
longer that I have taught truly, because he agrees 
with me so entirely in sense and almost in words, 
although he wrote at a different time, when other 
breezes blew." 

In all that we have hitherto stated we see a series 
of great preparatory labours, neither undertaken by 
caprice or obstinacy, nor conceived by individual 
schemes or self-conceit, but the providential result of 
the progress and influence of history ; a chain forming 
itself gradually and invisibly of numberless spiritual 
links, which in the end received in the heroic soul of 
Luther, as in a granite column, a central point of 
support, from whence it extended itself in all directions 
to form the frame of a new epoch. 

In this sense we have spoken of a reformation 
before Luther; let us now see the shape it took in 
Luther. 

THE REFORMATION IN LUTHER. 

How was he educated for his task, — he who was to 
be so powerful an instrument for the regeneration of 
the world? — Above all, through the severe training 
of external, and the ardent struggles of internal, life. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 145 

In the humiliating privations of poverty, under the 
strict and often severe hand of parental and school 
discipline, was the child of the Mansfeld miner to be 
steeled, body and mind, for his great work. Luther, 
like many others of our greatest men, had sprung 
from the kernel of our nation — the peasants and 
burghers. He was the son of a peasant from the 
Thuringian village Mocra, who, most likely with a 
view to obtaining more remunerative labour (the 
legend says, in consequence of some act committed in 
the heat of passion), had gone to reside first at Eisle- 
ben, afterwards at Mansfeld, where be became, by 
slow degrees and painful labour, if not a rich man, at 
least easy in his circumstances. In the same manner 
as many of our noblest spirits rise from the poverty 
and bitter want of their youth to importance and 
power, so Luther also learnt in early childhood " to 
eat his bread in sorrow." " My parents," he relates, 
" were at first really poor. My father was a wood- 
cutter, and my mother carried the wood for sale on 
her back ; by this means they fed us children ; they 
struggled hard." In his earliest youth, as soon as he 
was capable of receiving religious impressions, the 
germ of that earnest and heartfelt piety was implanted 
in his soul, which became afterwards the most distin- 
guishing characteristic of his life : the example of his 
vigorous severe father, and pious serious mother, 
effected this without many words. Their severity, 
10 



146 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



however, degenerated sometimes to improper harsh- 
ness : 66 My father flogged me so severely one day, 
that I fled, and took a dislike to him, which he could 
only gradually overcome by kindness ; my mother, 
again, beat me one day for some worthless nut, until 
my blood flowed ; and their serious strict manner of 
living made me run away afterwards into a monastery 
and become a monk. They meant well, but did not 
know how to adjust or measure punishment." 

Still, no one knew better than himself how much 
he owed to the training both of poverty and of 
parents : " It is a great kindness not to let children 
have their own way, whether you check them by 

threats or by flogging It is also a great crueltj', 

nay a horrid murder, if a father does not punish his 
child : if thou dost not flog thy son, he will become a 
villain, and Master Hans* will have to punish him 
with his deadly rod. Those who humble themselves 
and suffer, will grow up to be somebody; but those 
who are proud and do not submit to punishment, will 
go to destruction." Again alluding to the moral 
strengthening through poverty and privation, he 
says : " The children of rich people rarely turn out 
well : they are confident, bold, and proud; they think 
they need learn nothing, because they have enough 
to live on without it. On the contrary, poor people's 
sons have to raise themselves from the dust; they 
*The executioner; in English, Jack Ketch. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



147 



must suffer much ; and as they have nothing to boast 
of or to rely on, they learn to have confidence in 
God, they bow down and are silent. The poor fear 
God ; therefore does God give them good intellects, 
that they may study and learn well, become sensible 
and clever, and able to impart of their wisdom to 
princes, kings, and emperors." Such observations as 
these are doubtless inspired by the grateful remem- 
brance of his own youthful life and education. 

Not only in his home, but also in the school at 
Mansfeld, was he often treated with tyrannical seve- 
rity, so that it became for him " hell and purgatory, 
in which we were tormented with casualibtis and tem- 
poralibus, and yet learnt nothing, positively nothing, 
with all the flogging, trembling, fear, and misery." 

In his fourteenth year (1497) he left Manfeld in 
company with his schoolfellow John Reinecke, and 
visited the school of the Franciscans at Magdeburg. 
A year later he proceeded to Eisenach, the birthplace 
of his mother Margaret. There he enjoyed very 
superior instruction (until 1501) in the high school 
attached to the church of St. George (most likely 
from the gentle rector Trebonius). He only now 
felt the real desire to acquire knowledge ; and his pro- 
gress was soon after rendered easy by the kindness of 
Mrs. Ursula Cotta, who relieved him from the bitter 
want of the necessaries of life. At .Magdeburg, and 
at first at Eisenach, he had had to beg his breads 



148 M A R TIN LUTHER, AND THE 



singing in the streets, until that benevolent matron 
received the pious melancholy boy at her table, and 
perhaps also into her house. This conferred many 
blessings upon him ; the language and conduct of this 
kind-hearted and intelligent woman first inspired him 
with the ideal of a truly Christian family ; and in her 
house he also learned music, from which art he derived, 
next to the Scriptures, the sweetest consolation. 

When he left Eisenach, in 1501, to study at the 
university of Erfurt, there languished, imprisoned in 
the monastery adjoining his school, one of the men 
who had prepared the way for him, the Franciscan 
monk Hilten, a spiritual relation of Savonarola's, as 
yet unknown to Luther, who prophesied to his oppres- 
sors the advent of the hero : " He will attack you 
monks with vigour, and him ye will be unable to 
withstand." 

The young student distinguished himself during 
his academical career at Erfurt (1501-1505) by per- 
severing industry, moral purity, and piety. He took 
a degree in philosophy (in agister) as early as 1505; 
and now his father, who had grown rich in the mean 
time, wished him to study the law ; but he defeated 
all these plans and wishes by suddenly entering the 
monastery of the Augustines at Erfurt, and taking 
the vows. Here we stand at the all-important turning- 
point of his life, which we must comprehend in its 
innermost significance, if we wish to understand 




LUTHER DISCOVERS THE LATIN BIBLE IN THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 

AT ERFURT. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



149 



correctly the depths of Luther's inward being, and his 
entire future development. 

The discipline of external, and the severe struggles 
of internal life, we said, educated him for his task. 
These struggles of his soul led him into the monastery ; 
and there they attained a climax. As he did not 
attempt to set aside the spiritual and religious autho- 
rities of his day with contemptuous indifference, but 
grappled with them honestly and seriously, the ex- 
perience of his own heart and mind soon taught him 
that he could not draw from them the living water 
for which his soul languished. The more sincerely 
he strove for inward satisfaction, the more painfully 
was he convinced that the then existing accredited 
religious institutions were abandoned by the life- 
giving spirit. His coming into immediate mental 
conflict with those spiritual powers which stopped up 
and darkened the way to the truth which he sought, 
was of decisive importance. In monachism, scholas- 
tics, and in priestly hierarchy, he sought in vain for 
true peace to his soul — for real satisfaction and divine 
contentment. 

The spiritual man approaches the victory of the 
divine principle, life in eternal ideas, by three distinct 
paths. Communion with God, the reality of eternal 
life in man, is conceived either as moral, aesthetic, or 
speculative consciousness. We may say religion mani- 
fests herself irresistibly in every reflective being as a 



150 



MARTIN LUTHER, 



AND THE 



moral requirement, or as aesthetic or intellectual in- 
tuition. The first of these paths we call the ethic — 
the irresistible holy impulse the conscience feels to 
fill up, by some means, the great gulf between holi- 
ness and sin, between the blessed simplicity of the 
divine will and our unhappy, distracted, and defiled 
condition. The second path is the aesthetic — the 
lively perception of eternal beauty in the most diver- 
sified phenomena of existence; the inspired perception 
of the divine secret of nature, of art, and of life. 
We indicate the third path as the logical progress 
towards the oneness of thought, the conception of 
the truth in its creative ruling centre ; that striving 
of the mind thirsting after knowledge, which feels 
itself as it were banished when in the wretchedness 
of error and doubt. 

The more freely the religious consciousness is un- 
folded, the more evident will be its progress in the 
different paths ; and it will plunge again and again 
into the three springs of all spiritual life, from whence 
flows true religious individuality. Although, accord- 
ing to eternal laws, one of them may predominate, 
yet the complete want of one or another will ever 
affect us as a decay of a noble part, or the mutilation 
of the spiritual organism. Moral consciousness is the 
one indispensable creating and restrictive element of in- 
ward religion, which may for a time exist through it 
alone, independent of the two other elements ; these, how- 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 151 



ever, would but with difficulty preserve the vitality of 
the religion of the heart. 

In Luther we recognise great natural capabilities 
for a union of these fundamental principles of man's 
spiritual nature ; but the ethic principle showed itsdf 
most powerfully and decisively in the ardent and unap- 
peasable claims of his conscience; hence arose his voca- 
tion as a reformer. His energetic mind would admit 
no obscuration, falsifying, or deceptive explanation of 
the enormous contrast which an awakened conscience 
perceives between human imperfection and sin, and 
the divine perfection and holiness. He did not rest 
until he had attained, by unspeakable troubles, doubts, 
and sufferings, to a satisfactory reconciliation of the 
difficulties of this contrast. He found it (anticipating 
our subject) in the belief in the grace of God through 
Christ. " Justification through faith" God's free grace 
in Christ, — this became the clear and leading idea of 
his life, and of the reformation he originated. The 
abyss between the holy Creator and his sinful creature 
was bridged over for him by a new comprehension of 
the Saviour, at once historical and ideal ; by a saving 
view of the profound import of the Gospel, as an im- 
measurable inward experience prevailing through all 
ages, Christianity, as history and idea, drawn freshly 
from its original eternal sources, stood before him like 
the newly-discovered land of his soid's desire : no longer 
as a rigorous law, depressing and paralysing the soul ; 



152 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

but as the divine capacity to a new spiritual life, as 
a second birth of the will, and therefore of the entire 
man. 

The above will furnish, in the outset, the most 
satisfactory explanation of the course of Luther's 
religious development to his disputes with Rome; the 
internal history of that which in our introduction we 
have called " the Reformation in Luther." His en- 
trance into the monastery is to us the first important 
step towards this development. What induced him 
to this step was, unmistakably, a burning desire for 
salvation, for a degree of moral and religious perfection 
which he thought could only be reached in a monas- 
tery. That he was influenced in the first instance, in 
his view of human salvation and reconciliation with 
God, by purely monastic ideas, was in reality the 
cause of his becoming a monk. 

The terror he experienced when the lightning fell 
close beside him, — the death of his friend in a 
thunderstorm, — in short, every impression, every 
event which brought death, eternity, and judgment 
strongly before his mind, caused him to tremble in his 
innermost heart. In this condition of mind he felt 
that he could not stand before the eternal Judge; 
only the holy dare approach the Holy one. But 
where find holiness, if not in the monastery ? 

That such was his predominant train of thought 
can be proved by his own words : his description of a 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



153 



picture which was meant symbolically to represent 
the monastic conception of the Christian church, is 
characteristic of the ideas which he entertained in his 
youth: "They had painted a great ship, called the 
6 Holy Christian church therein sat no layman, nor 
kings, nor princes; only the pope, cardinals, and bish- 
ops in the prow, below the Holy Ghost ; and monks 
and priests at the sides, at the oars ; and so they sailed 
towards heaven. But the laymen were swimming in 
the waters round the ship: some w 7 ere drowning; a 
few dragged themselves towards the ship by ropes and 
cables which the holy fathers threw out to them from 
their great goodness, allowing them to share in their 
good works, and helping them, that they might not 
be drowned, but reach heaven clinging to the ship. 
And there was no pope, cardinal, nor bishop in the 
water, but only laymen. Such a picture was an 
image and brief conception of their doctrine respect- 
ing the laity, and it is the same picture which they 
had in their books ; this they cannot deny. For I 
have been myself one of those fellows who have helped 
to teach this, and have believed and not known other- 
wise." 

The words of a later letter to his father are equally 
significant: "This is now nearly the sixteenth year 
of my monkery, into which I entered without your 

knowledge I remember but too well, when we 

had been reconciled and you talked to me, and I said 



154 



MARTIN LUTHER, A N D THE 



to A'ou that I had been called by a dreadful apparition 
from heaven) for I became a monk not willingly, still 
less to fatten my body, but because, when I was encom- 
passed by quick-coming death, I vovsed a forced and 
hasty voto ; and you said immediately, ' I pray God it 
may not be a devilish spirit.' That word, as if God 
had spoken it out of your mouth, pierced and sank 
deep into my soul ; but I closed and barred my heart 
as well as I could against you and your word." 

All his observations at different times agree in this : 
" 1 thought, ' Oh, if I go into a monastery, and serve 
God in shaven crown and cowl, he will reward and 
welcome me !' For no other reason did I enter 
orders, but that I might serve and please God ever- 
lastingly. We knew nothing that a Christian ought 
to know, — what God,, the world, the church, sin or 
forgiveness of sin, meant; — they had darkened and 
suppressed all. We knew not otherwise than the 
priests and monks were all in all; and upon their 

works we stood, and not upon Christ When I 

had begun to study the humanities and philosophy, 
and had learned and acquired enough to take my 
degree, I might have followed the example of others, 
and have in my turn taught the young people and 
instructed them ; or I might have proceeded with my 
own studies. But I left my parents, relations, and 
friends, and went into a monastery against their will. 
For I had been persuaded to believe that I should do 



REFORMATION I N GERMANY. 



155 



God good service in that station by such hard and 

painful works Every man has a big monk 

sitting in his bosom ; that is, we would willingly boast 
of our exceedingly good works, and be able to say : 
' Behold, I have done this ! I have to-day paid God 
with prayers and good works.' We deem ourselves 
pure by nature, so as not to stand in need of mercy, 
but be acknowledged just and pious through our own 
merits. This naughtiness and hypocrisy is deeply 
rooted in our flesh." 



And what did he find in the monastery? Did he 
there attain to the blessed peace of mind which a 
vague mysterious presentiment had fore-shadowed ? 
Instead of the much-hoped-for peace, his distress and 
trouble of mind increased during the first years. In 
vain brother Augustine (as he was now called) sub- 
mitted to the meanest exercises of humiliation, now 
doing the menial work of the monastery, now travers- 
ing the streets of Erfurt with the beggar's wallet, 
collecting alms for it; in vain he increased the casti- 
gations of his body, fasting, praying, watching to 
excess ; in vain he studied the Latin Bible with the 
spiritual hunger of a mind eager for salvation, but 
without the indispensable key to the understanding 
of the Scriptures, — that Bible he had so longed to 
become thoroughly acquainted with while at the uni- 



156 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

versity, on seeing it for the first time ! In vain ; he 
felt himself separated from God by an abyss, which, 
deepened the more, the more he strove, with suicidal 
agony and effort, to fill it up by his own spotless 
sanctity. He describes the condition of his mind at 
that period in these words : 

" When I first became a monk, I would willingly 
have taken heaven by storm ; I thought my monkery 
would suffice. In all this, what did I seek but God ? 
who was to see how I kept the rules of mine order, 
and the strict life I led? I lived continually in a 
dream and in real idolatry. It is true I have been a 
pious monk, and so strictly kept by mine order, that 
I may say, if ever a monk reached heaven through 
monkery, I ought to have gone also : this all the 
brethren of the monastery who have known me will 
bear witness to ; for if it had lasted much longer, I 
should have tormented myself to death with watching, 
praying, and other works of devotion. In popery 
we mad saints have made one ordinance after another, 
and no end of rules ; they have served to terrify the 
conscience, and caused the people to thirst for the 
truth, — a thirst which their preachers have done 
nothing to allay. When I was a monk, I crucified 
Christ every day, and slandered him by the false con- 
fidence which at that time clove to me. It is true I 
was not like other people; outwardly I kept my vows 
of chastity, neither did I trouble myself concerning 



REFORMATION IN 



G E R M A N Y . 



15V 



the things of this life. . . . but beneath this sanctity 
arid false confidence, I felt in the integrity of my own 
heart continual mistrust and doubts, fear and hatred, 
and I even blasphemed God. When a monk in the 
monastery, I was outwardly much more sanctified 
than I am now; .... my life had great glory in the 
eyes of the people, but not in mine own eyes, for I 

had a broken spirit and was ever sorrowful My 

experience when a monk was this : while grievously 
tormenting myself with watching and studying, 
doubts still remained in my conscience : who knows, 
thought I, whether all this be really agreeable and 
pleasing to God or not ? When I was most devout, I 
still approached the altar in unbelief, and in unbelief 
I withdrew from it. If I had made confession, I still 
doubted ; and if I omitted it, I fell into despair : for 
we were so miserably deluded, that we thought we 
could not pray, and would not be heard, unless we 
were pure and free from sin, like angels in heaven. 
As a monk, I deemed myself lost when I felt a desire 
of the flesh, such as unchastity, or wrath, hatred, 
envy, &c. against a brother. I tried many remedies ; 
I confessed every day; but it was of no use, — the 
desires revived again. Therefore I could not be 
satisfied, but tormented myself continually with such 
thoughts as these : ' Behold, thou hast committed such 
and such sin ... . therefore it is of no avail that thou 
hast taken holy orders; all thy good works are 



I5S MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

naught !' The greatest temptation of the devil is 
that when he says: ' God is the enemy of sinners; 
thou art a sinner; therefore is God thine enemy.' If 
in this case we do not make the distinction that God 
is the enemy of the unrepentant sinner only, conscience 
lies conquered, and w r e despair. When conscience 
is told the law must be fulfilled, must be kept. — it 
concludes from that hour, thou must keep the law, 
or thou art condemned ; thou hast not kept it, thou 
canst not keep it ! Then begin everlasting agony and 

pangs of conscience The word righteous, and the 

righteousness of God, were to me like a clap of thunder. 
Formerly, in popish times, we cried for eternal salva- 
tion and the kingdom of the Lord'; we have sought 
it, and knocked day and night. I myself, if I had 
not been saved through the consolations of the Gospel 
of Christ, could not have lived two years longer, so 
much did I torment myself, striving to flee from the 
wrath of God; neither were tears and sighs wanting; 
but we did not attain to any thing with all this. A 
monk with his masses and his many other works either 
becomes self-righteous or he despairs. As an expe- 
rienced monk, having striven earnestly to be one, I 
may truly call monkery an infernal poisoned pill 
covered with sugar. For, the consolatory promise, 
that a man could make himself spiritually alive and 
blessed without the intervention of Christ and his 
Holy Spirit, was beyond measure sweet to hear, and 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 159 

tasted richly to the mind ; indeed, we meant to go to 
heaven, and gain the kingdom of heaven by stealth. 
.... That was the sugar which enticed us to monkery 
and its baptism. Afterwards, when we had swallowed 
the pill, we found the poison,— that Christ was lost, 
and was now no longer a saviour and comforter, but 
a wrathful judge in our hearts; and were tormented 

by fears, doubts, and terror To sum up all, — a 

monastery is a hell." 

As seriously and severely as he sought tp embody 
monachism in himself, so highly did he regard his 
consecration as a priest (1507) ; but this rather in- 
creased his fear and terror, instead of leading him to 
better knowledge and peace of mind. Even while 
celebrating his first mass, he was nearly overcome by 
inward shuddering and horror when he came to the 
words in which he was to offer up " to Almighty God 
this spotless sacrifice" for his own and others' sins, for 
the living and the dead. He felt, " How can I address 
the high majesty of God, when men tremble before a 
king even ?" This inward trouble afflicted him for a 
long time. " The ungodly," he writes at a later 
period, " do not see and feel the wrath of God ; they 
live on without fear. A man who fears God and 
believes in him, however, feels at all times more sin 
than grace, more wrath than love of God ; the more 
pious he is, the more he feels the struggle of the flesh 
against the spirit. I was very pious in the monastery, 



160 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



and yet even sorrowful, because I thought God was not 
merciful unto me. I celebrated mass and prayed, and 
after confession and mass I could never be satisfied in 

my heart I have been a monk for fifteen years, 

have daily said masses and read the Psaltery, so that 

I knew it by heart And never did I get so far 

with all these masses, prayings, and watchings, that I 
could have said, 6 Now I am certain that God is merci- 
ful unto me.' It is no wonder that in popish times 
people should have feared and been horrified at the 
sacrament, for they perverted the sweet and lovely 
sacrament with gall, wormwood, and vinegar ; they have 
taught us we must be so pure, that not one grain of 
dust of daily sin should cling to us ; this I could not 
discover in me, and therefore I was frightened at the 
sacrament. And this terror, which I have learnt in 
popish times, and to winch I have become accustomed, 
clings to me even to this day, although I should now 
approach it joyfully. When I meant to take the 
acrament, I thought if I could only remain free from 
m\ for one hour, that I might receive the sacrament 
worthily; therefore was it my use and wont, when I 
had prayed the appointed time and said mass, to close 
always at the end with these words : 6 I come to thee, 
my dear Lord Jesus, and I pray thee to deign to 
accept all that I have done and suffered in mine order 
as a set-off against my sins.' I had chosen one-and- 
twenty saints, said mass every day, and addressed 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 16 f 

three of them, so that they reached out the week; 
and particularly did I pray to the holy Virgin, because 
her woman's heart might be more easily moved tc 
reconcile me to her Son. Thus were we who longed 
to live a righteous life tormented by the pope, who. 
by means of his monks, makes such countless snares 
wherewith to entangle consciences." 

In those days he still looked upon the authority of 
the pope and of the church of Rome with the same 
deep veneration as the monks and priests ; with 
feelings of the most unconditional subjection, peculiar 
to ardent believers in the middle ages. He might 
easily have degenerated into a fanatical judge of 
heretics, into a zealous persecutor like Saul, if occasion 
had served. " If ever there was one," he says him- 
self, " who, before the re-appearance of the light of 
the Gospel, deeply revered the pope's laws and the 
traditions of the fathers, and zealously strove for them 
in great seriousness, esteemed them and the keeping 
of them a sanctuary, burned for them, and deemed 
them necessary to salvation, truly it was I. So great 
was the pope's authority with me, that I considered 
the deviating from him in the very least article a sin 
worthy of eternal damnation ; and this godless idea 
caused me to look upon Huss as so damnable a heretic, 
as to make it a heavy sin only to think of him ; and 
to defend the authority of the pope I would willingly 
have lighted up a fire myself to burn the heretic, and 
11 



162 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



believed I had shown the strictest obedience to God in 
so doing." He says he sincerely revered the pope, 
and in those days he would readily have torn with his 
teeth any one who would have persuaded him to the 
faith he afterwards embraced. " If any one," he 
asserts in one place, " in the time when I was a pious 
holy monk, and said mass every day, and knew not 
otherwise than that I was walking in the right path 
straight to heaven, had told me that all this sanctity 
was of no avail, and that I was an enemy of the cross 
of Christ, I should willingly have assisted in carrying 
stones and wood to stone such a Stephen to death, or 
destroy him by fire." 

This series of confessions will afford to every reader 
at all familiar with the phenomena of spiritual life a 
clear insight into Luther's state of mind. He was 
still entirely under the dominion of those priestly 
forces against which he arose afterwards with such 
mighty power, and whose downfall was mainly brought 
about by him. A thorough monk, priest, and Romish 
scholiast, he struggled, with exhausting efforts, 
gradually to free himself from these deep religious 
impressions. He had embraced with passionate 
energy those forms of the church imposed by the 
spirit of hierarchy and monachism, which at that 
period were spiritually defunct ; yet he was the very 
man destined successfully to attack and vanquish 
these forms. He began his labours, ?wt by dissenting 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 163 

from them, not by casting off the religious ordinances 
of the time ; on the contrary, he began with the most 
humble subjection to them, with the most ardent 
desire to accept them wholly. And even when his 
inward experience and growing knowledge, after over- 
coming the extreme of confusion, compelled him to 
throw them off, he raised himself to this recantation 
only by the power of a more heartfelt and solemn 
conviction. If the agonising cries of conscience, the 
spiritual thirst after truth, had not stirred him ; if 
they had not, although misunderstood for a long time, 
directed him day and night from stale and turbid 
waters to the living fountains, Martin Luther would 
have remained, without doubt, one of the most 
zealous monks of the sixteenth century. 

When in later years he called his monastic life lost 
years ; when he lamented that he had there lost the 
salvation and bliss of his soul and the health of his 
body ; he took only one view of the case, and did not 
duly estimate the importance of these years. The 
horror which seized him when looking back from a 
higher and freer position, to the obscure and gloomy 
conditions of a period of his life now left behind him, 
was natural ; it was a sensation such as may be ex- 
perienced by those who have exchanged the oppressive 
air of a prison for the life-giving breezes of the moun- 
tains. 

At other times he clearly recognised that even 



164 M A R T I N LUTHER, AND THE 

these sad and soul-destroying years formed a necessary 
part of the entire course of his experience and 
culture. Later he frequently expressed himself to 
the effect, that he owed it to those temptations th.at 
he had been compelled to search more and more 
deeply ; that the holy Scriptures could not be compre- 
hended without experience and study ; temptation, he 
said, is the chivalry of Christians, God does not 
choose bold presumptuous persons to do his work upon 
earth, but those who have been well tried, smoothed, 
and broken in. In the poetical expressions of a child- 
like mind, he seeks to unfold the spiritual direction he 
had received : "If God means to try us, he causes 
many obstacles to be thrown in our way, that we may 
not at once trace his dealings ; as one sports with a 
little worm, throwing a rod or a leaf before it where 
it creeps, that it may not be able to go straightforward, 
but has to turn hither and thither in different 
directions, ere it get away at last. But we do not 
understand this method of divine mercy in the 
beginning, and interpret the very blessings which are 
placed before our eyes as the means of our destruc- 
tion." 

At Eisenach the kindness of Mistress Cotta had 
helpfully met the poor scholar. At Erfurt the gentle 
Dr. Staupitz held out a saving hand to the monk 
hungering after righteousness and peace ; he prepared 
a new turning-point in his religious experience and in 



REFORMATION 



IN GERMANY. 



165 



his life. We learn from Luther's own words, that 
" the light of the Gospel first shone in the darkness 
of his heart through the words of Staupitz." 

He did not find in the monastery, among his com- 
panions, the assistance, the spiritual advancement, 
which he sought so eagerly; they could not properly 
comprehend his mental afflictions. He himself com- 
plains : " No one could comfort me under those fearful 
temptations I had to bear, which consumed my body 
and breath, and often made me doubt whether I had 
any brains remaining in my head. Those to whom I 
complained knew nothing of such temptations ; and I 
often cried ; ' Is it I alone, then, who have to bear 
this affliction ?' " The brethren of his monastery 
sought to console him with simple words, probably 
under the direction of the vicar-general Staupitz. 
" Knowest thou not," said his preceptor on one 
occasion, "that our Lord himself has commanded us 
to hope and to believe?" At confession, one of the 
brethren called out to him : " Thou art a fool ! God 
is not angry with thee, thou art angry with him : be 
not thou wrathful with him, and he will be less angry 
with thee !" Another time, an old monk, to whom he 
confessed, referred him very impressively to the 
article of the Apostles' Creed on the remission of sins, 
and to portions of the homilies of St. Bernard, in 
order to convince him that he also might obtain the 
remission of sins which is pronounced in the absolution. 



166 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



It was, however, reserved for the fatherly exhorta- 
tions of Staupitz to produce a decisive impression upon 
the soul of Luther. In the remarkable letter to 
Staupitz (dated 1518), in which he gives a brief sum- 
mary of his inward history to the period of the 
dispute concerning the indulgences, he says, that when 
Staupitz taught him that " true repentance began with 
the love of righteousness and of God" while those con- 
science-tormentors, the scholiasts, taught that it (true 
repentance) ended with it, it appeared to him " like 
a voice from heaven." This word had clung to him like 
an arrow sped by a strong man ; and he had found in 
the Scriptures, on carefully studying them, its fullest 
confirmation ; so that thenceforward no expression in 
the Scriptures sounded in his ear more sweetly than 
the word repentance, which, so long as his love of 
God was fancied or forced, had been the bitterest of 
all ; "for the laws of God become sweet unto us when 
we read and understand them, not only in books, but 
in the wounds of our precious Saviour." It is evident 
from these words, that he lays the greatest weight 
upon the fact that the living knowledge of Christ as 
the Saviour of the world had been revealed to him 
only through the correct understanding of the word 
repentance; and that he owes the first key to this 
knowledge to the fatherly counsel of Staupitz. 

This gentle friend prepared the agonised soul of 
Luther for the consolations of Augustin and of Ger- 



REFORMATION IN GER M ANT. 



1G7 



man mysticism, both emanating from the Christian 
religion as explained by St. Paul and St. John — the 
religion of a loving heart, and of tried spiritual ex- 
perience. 

Even Staupitz could not at once comprehend the 
spiritual condition of his unhappy friend. When 
Luther confessed to him the very foundation of his 
difficulties (den redden Khoten), he did not understand 
him at all, and gave him a most dreadful shock : he 
says, " Then I became a mere dead body." At meals 
Staupitz attempted to cheer him thus: "Ye are sad, 
brother Martin. I have never experienced tempta- 
tions like thine; but, as far as I can understand thee 
and them, all thou needest is better eating and drink- 
ing. God hath not sent these good things to thee in 
vain; without them, thou canst do no good." u He 
imagined," says Luther, " that I, being learned, might 
become proud and self-sufficient without these tempta- 
tions." And when he complained that he had been 
much shocked during a procession at the host which 
Staupitz had carried, the latter replied: "Alas! thy 
thoughts are not of Christ; for Christ frighteneth not, 
but only consoleth." 

On one occasion, when he had given vent to his 
griefs in writing, " My sins ! my sins ! my sins !" the 
vicar-general said in answer : " Thou strivest to be 
free from sin, and hast yet no real sin : make a register 
of what are sins in reality, and do not deal in such 



168 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



paltry fancies, or deem every trifle a sin, if Christ is 

to help thee Thou makest thyself a sinner in 

thy fancy, and then seekest an equally fancied Christ 
to be thy Saviour. Take to heart that Christ is the 
real true Saviour, as thou art a real sinner/' Luther's 
doubts and speculations upon predestination, and 
whether and upon what grounds any one might look 
upon himself as saved or rejected by God, were also 
corrected by Staupitz. " Predestination is to be found 
and understood in the wounds of Christ, — nowhere 
else ; for it is written : ' Hear ye Him !' The Father 
is too high : therefore he says : 6 1 will show you a 
path by which ye may come unto me, namely Christ : 
believe in him, cling to him, and ye will find in due 
time ivho I am T For God is incomprehensible, and 
we cannot conceive or understand what he is, still less 
what are his purposes; he is not to be comprehended ; 
and, in short, he will not be known, except through 
Christ. Therefore set Christ well before you; then 
predestination is assured, and thou art already elect." 
This is clearly the language of theological experience, 
of the religion of the heart, intended to lead Luther 
from his exhausting spiritual torments and profound 
speculations back to the simplicity of the Gospel ; it 
is the language of that unobtrusive but steadfast piety 
which opposes facts, the experiences of faith working 
by love, to theoretical questions foreign to its true 
spirit. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 169 

On this subject Luther wrote even in the year 1542 
to the Count Albrecht of Mansfield : "It would grieve 
me to the heart if your lordship should be troubled with 
these thoughts and temptations, for I myself have 
been troubled with them; and if Dr. Staupitz, or 
rather God through Staupitz, had not helped me out, 
I should have been overwhelmed by them, and been 
long ago in hell. For such devilish thoughts cause 
faint-hearted people to become desperate and to despair 
of God's mercy : or they are bold and courageous, 
become blasphemers and enemies, and say : ' Let come 
what may, I will do as I like, for all is lost !"' How 
gladly he quotes, even at a still later period, those 
words of his fatherly friend which had been especially 
consoling to him : a Dr. Staupitz used to say : God's 
law says to man, Here is a great mountain, cross it ; 
then the flesh and presumption say, I will ; but con- 
science cries, Thou canst not ! I give it up, answers 
despair ! Thus the law begets in man either presump- 
tion or despair." Again he recalls the deep impression 
which the confession of that humble-minded man 
made upon him : " I have vowed to our Lord God 
more than a thousand times that I would be holy ; but 
I have never kept that vow, and I know that I shall 
never keep it. Therefore I will not any longer 
resolve upon being holy, for I see well that it is im- 
possible ; I will lie no more ; I will pray for a blessed 
death. If God be not merciful unto me for Christ's 



1 70 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

sake, I shall not stand the test with all my vows and 
good works, but must be lost." Luther calls this a 
glorious speech : " It has given me a new light (eine 
neue Kunst), that my own righteousness can avail 
nothing before God." 

And even then he approached this truth only by 
slow degrees, with dear-bought victories over con- 
stantly-recurring obstacles and doubts. But this slow 
and painful birth of saving knowledge is the most signi- 
ficant event, followed by the most important consequences, 
in Luther s spiritual history ; and upon the lively 
comprehension of which, a just appreciation of him 
and of his labours must in a great measure be based. 

We perceive him still struggling for a deeper and 
more satisfactory comprehension of the Christian 
mystery of the remission of sin, — the very kernel of 
religious conviction, from which a more complete and 
spiritual conception of Christianity was to spring 
forth. On looking back to these beginnings, Luther 
said : " It is easy talking of remission of sin ; indeed, 
the whole Christian doctrine is easy. Truly, if words 
would suffice ; but if it comes to a struggle in earnest, 
we perceive our ignorance. For it is a great thing to 
be able to conceive and believe with heartfelt faith 
that all my sins are forgiven, and that I am justified 
before God through such faith. I have experienced 
often, and experience more and more clearly every 
day, how beyond all measure difficult this is 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



171 



Whoever can look upon Christ as his loving Saviour 
conquers all." He was, indeed, already approaching 
this point, when at Christmas he joined, with an 
internal emotion of relief hitherto unknown to him, 
in the hymn : "0 blessed guilt, which hast gained for 
us such a Redeemer!" (0 beata culpa, quce talem 
meruisti Redemptorem .) 

The truth thus arising within him was gradually 
con firmed by reflection, and comparing certain passages 
of Scripture, which formed thenceforth the corner-stone 
of his religious knowledge. These were the words of 
the prophet Habakkuk (ii. 4), " But the just shall live 
by faith;" and of the Apostle Paul (Rom. i. 17), who 
calls the Gospel " the power of God unto salvation to 
them that believe. For therein is the righteousness 
which sufficed i before God revealed from faith to faith." 
The words, "which sufficeth before God," are Luther's 
own free translation, warranted by the sense and con- 
nexion of the original ; the literal translation would 
be, u the righteousness of God."* 

"I had the most intense desire rightly to compre- 
hend St. Paul's epistle to the Romans, but was always 
stopped by the word ' righteousness.' I was greatly 
averse to the words, 'the righteousness of God; for, 
according to the custom of the schools, I had been 
taught that I was to understand it in a philosophical 
sense, as the righteousness according to which God is 



* As in the English version. 



172 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

just and punisheth sinners. Although blameless in 
conduct, I yet felt myself a great sinner before God ; 
I was also gifted with a tender conscience, and did not 
presume to reconcile myself to God through my own 
merits and good works. I felt, therefore, no love for 
a just and incensed God, but was wroth with him in 

secret Then I reflected day and night upon 

the true meaning of Paul, and became aware at last 
that it must be understood thus: 6 The justice of Gxt 
is satisfied by the righteousness revealed in the Gosjiet, 
through which, in his mercy and graciousness, he justi- 
fies us; as it is written, The just shall live by faith.' 
Thus I soon felt as if born again; as if I had found tJie 
gates of Paradise thrown wide ojjen to me. Now I also 
looked upon the blessed Scriptures more reverently 
than in former times, and read them through rapidly. 
As I had formerly hated the expression, ■ the righte- 
ousness of God,' I now esteemed it as full of consola- 
tion ; and this passage of St. Paul's epistle in which 
it occurs was now in truth the gate of Paradise. 
Until then I had been wanting only in that I looked 
upon the Law and the Gospel as one, and deemed 
there was no difference between Christ and Moses but 
that of time and degree of perfection ; but when I 

discovered the real difference, then I was free 

Even at the present day I feel horrified when I hear 
or read the words justus Deus, so strongly doth deep- 
rooted habit cling to me ! I laboured industriously 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 173 

'ind anxiously to understand the text of Paul (Rom,. 
I. 17), until at length, through the help of the Holy 
Spirit, I was enabled rightly to weigh the words of 

the prophet Habakkuk From them I came to 

the conclusion, that life must arise from faith; thai 
man is just before God through faith. Then the holy 
Scriptures, nay heaven itself was opened to my spirit." 

If at Erfurt the intimacy with Staupitz had been 
of great importance to Luther's development, its con- 
sequences became infinitely more important on his 
translation to Wittenberg (1508). Staupitz wished to 
promote his young friend to a post in this new uni- 
versity, in order to present a field for activity to a 
mind so long dejected and oppressed. 

The following nine years (1508-1517), spent at 
Wittenberg, had this influence upon Luther : they 
diminished his extravagant monkish labours for the 
good of his soul, by means of the exertions his duty 
compelled him to make for the good of others ; they 
also made him more intimately acquainted ( a matter 
of such immense importance) with mankind and the 
real practice of the world. All this, of necessity, 
exercised a highly beneficial influence upon his spiri- 
tual progress. As philosophical, and afterwards 
theological, teacher at the university ; as preacher to 
the monastery and in the town church; on his 
journey to Rome, and in the practical business of his 
order, which was confided to him by Staupitz for some 



174 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

time ; — in all these diversified relations be learnt with 
ever-increasing intelligence to judge of the real aspect 
of his time. 

His observations upon his visit to Rome (1510) 
prove how little be then believed himself called to be 
the opponent of popery, although much of what he 
saw and heard revolted his earnest mind, and in- 
fluenced him at a later period. " It so happened to 
me at Rome," he writes twenty years later, " when I 
was one of those foolish saints, that I ran through all 
churches and crypts, and believed all the fables told 
about them .... We knew no better. I have cele- 
brated mass some ten times at Rome ; and I was 
actually sorry that my father and mother were still 
alive, as I might otherwise have released them from 
purgatory by masses and other costly works. Among 
other coarse observations, I have heard the courtesans 
and other lewd people laugh and boast at table as 
how some said mass, and while blessing the bread and 
wine said these words: Pan-is es, et pan ts manebis ; 
vinum es, et vinum manebis (thou art bread, and bread 
thou wilt remain : thou art wine, and wine thou wilt 
remain). What could I think of all this? Do they 
talk thus freely and publicly here at Rome at table, 
as if pope, cardinals, courtesans, and all, thus said 
mass together ? .... I was quite disgusted with their 
off-hand manner of celebrating mass, as if they were 
playing juggling tricks; for before I could get as far 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



175 



as the gospel in mine, the priest nearest to me had 
finished his, and called out to me : ' Passa, passa ! 
Have done ; come away !' I wish that every person 
intended to be a preacher could first go to Eome and 
see what is done there. I have heard them myself 
say, ' If there is a hell, Rome is built on the top of 
it !' No one will credit the roguery carried on, the 
awful and shameful sin committed in Rome : no one 
could be persuaded that such villany exists, unless he 
witnessed and experienced it. The higher their 
honours and dignities, the more wantonly they sin ; 
so that we have now a new proverb : 6 The nearer to 
Rome, the worse the Christian.'" Luther's great 
aversion to the dark features in the character of the 
unhappy degraded Italian nation owes its origin prin- 
cipally to his residence in Italy : " The Italians have 
cunning, intriguing heads : they must be put to shame, 
and their degraded state exposed, that they may not 
despise others, as if tliey were the only wise people; 
for a hard knot needeth a sharp wedge. For this 
reason I have always advised that our youths, when 
they have mastered the Catechism, and are properly 
grounded in the Word of God, should be sent to 
Italy to see the wickedness and roguery there, and 

thus learn to protect themselves therefrom The 

Italians laugh and mock at us because we believe in 
the Scriptures. They are either very superstitious or 
epicurean ; a small number of them only believe in 



176 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

the resurrection of the dead ; and it is a common 
saying in Italy, when they mean to go to church : 
' Let us go to the common error (gemeinen Irrthum) !' 
They are an intelligent and clever people, aware of 
the pride of the pope and the ignorance of the monks, 
who deride all religion as a fable When a Ger- 
man has adopted the epicurean philosophy in Italy, 
and digested this hellish pill, he becomes much worse 
and more full of malice than an Italian." 

In the five years which elapsed between his obtain- 
ing the doctor's degree (1512) and his first public 
attack on the sale of indulgences (1517), he advanced 
rapidly in his spiritual development as a reformer. 
The oath taken at the ordination justified his proceed- 
ings to his conscience, and proved of great value to 
him in subsequent temptations. "We must have a 
certain divine call to a good work," he observes on 
this subject, " and not our own inclination only. 
Those who have a sure call from God for the beginning 
and completing of a good work find it difficult enough. 
What, then, can those do who proceed without a call, 
and seek only their own honour and glory?" Thus 
did he express himself, who considered the authority 
of conscience as the first indispensable condition of all 
his doings and endeavours ; the authority of a con- 
science, be it observed, which relied solely on the 
divine call, on the certainty of unison with the divine 
will 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 177 

As a teacher at the university, and as a preacher, 
he freed himself, with ever-increasing certainty and 
clearness, from the oppressive shackles of the current 
philosophy and divinity of the schools; he became 
more and more alive to the fact, that he must break 
loose from the traditional forms of philosophy, from 
those fetters of the soul and the understanding pro- 
tected by the name of Aristotle. "I said," these are 
his own words, " that we ought to prove, not merely 
to suppose ; and so I freed myself by degrees from the 
sophists, and with much prayer proceeded in my 
studies in my own way." In a letter to his friend 
Lange at Erfurt (1516), his aversion to the Aristote- 
lian philosophy, and to the whole system of study 
established in those days, is already expressed in 
vehement language ; he had not only separated from 
them mentally, but he was eager to meet them in 
open opposition. The spiritual battle of Reuchlin 
and Hutten against certain persecuting and insidious 
individuals among the monks and the adherents of 
the old school of philosophy, which was raging most 
furiously just at that moment, could not fail to 
exercise an encouraging influence upon Luther's 
mind. He had arrived even then at the decisive con- 
viction which he expressed later (1520) in the fiery 
words of intense hatred — the conviction that Aristotle 
and Christ were as far distant one from the other as 
heaven is from earth ; and that Christian truth, 
12 



178 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



instead of being the serf of the Aristotelian philo- 
spph'y, ought to be drawn henceforward from its own 
original sources alone. " I am grieved at heart that 
that proud heathen should seduce and befool with his 
false words so many of the worthiest Christians. . . . „ . 
That miserable fellow teaches in his best book, de 
Anima, that the soul is mortal with the body; . . . . 
as if we had not got the holy Scriptures, in which we 
are taught abundantly those things of which Aristotle 
had never got the least scent ! Yet hath the dead 
heathen conquered and hindered, nay almost sup- 
pressed the books of the living God In the 

same way, the book of Ethics, more than any other 
book, is directly opposed to God's grace and Christian 
virtue." 

In the pulpit he impressed upon his hearers, as 
early as 1515. the fundamental idea of his conception 
of Christian life, that all our actions are valued by 
God only according to the motives from which they arise. 
This one principle attacked the very centre of 
monkish morality and views of human life, — the in- 
animate mechanism of so-called "good works" — i. e. 
piety according to the prescribed measure of penances, 
castigations, fasting, praying, pilgrimages, &c. — was 
here condemned and rejected already as the petrifac- 
tion of all heartfelt religion and spiritual life, although 
this sentence of condemnation had not yet been pro- 
nounced in plain words as afterwards. Yet was he 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



179 



bold enough at that time when he preached ; for a 
beginner (in Christian faith and life) much fasting, 
watching, and praying (asceticism generally) might 
be necessary, but it became a great hindrance to more 
advanced believers. " As rain-drops," he says in one 
of his sermons, " fall upon the land, so falls the word 
upon the hearts of men, so hath Christ descended on 
the nations through his word; and as the rain falls 
independent of the work of our hands, so descends 

the mercy of Christ independent of our merits 

The Lord will be our hen * of salvation, but we will 
not have him. For this is what I meant to say, that 
toe cannot he saved through our own righteousness, but 
we must fly under the wings of this our hen, that we 
may receive from her fulness what is wanting in us. 
But those who walk securely become the prey of the 
vultures; they will not hear the voice of the hen, 
which crieth out to them that their own righteousness 
is sin." 

In the above we have witnessed the quiet gradual 
progress which was made, often in the darkest depths 
of the human mind, towards that which we have pre- 
viously called The Reformation in Luther. One step — 
a most difficult one — remained to the Eeformation 
through Luther. 

Whoever enters the monastic cells of Erfurt and 
Wittenberg which were occupied by Luther, may say 

* Matthew xxiii. 37, "Even as a hen gathereth her chickens." 



180 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



to himself, without exaggeration, " In that confined 
space one of the greatest and most influential struggles 
was experienced ever recorded in the history of the 
world; the transition of the Christian conscience from 
the middle ages to modern times; the breaking forth 
of heartfelt from mere external religion ; the deliverance 
of free spiritual and personal Christianity from the 
preparatory wrappings of forms and ordinances!' 



SECOND SKETCH. 

STRUGGLE WITH ROME. 

We have accompanied Luther to the threshold of 
his career as a reformer; we have sought to trace 
those mighty thoughts and deeds which were here- 
after to shake the world, to their secret origin in the 
mind of the almost unknown monk and professor. 
He now appears upon a wider stage, amidst events of 
world-wide interest, whose profound signification we 
must endeavour to apprehend, if we would bring the 
image of the reformer impressively and vividly before 
our mind's eye. Among these great historical events, 
his struggle against Eome stands in the foreground ; 
it gave European importance to the German doctor; 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



181 



and even now numberless persons connect no other 
idea with the name of Luther than that of a victo- 
rious opponent to popery. 

I. The Struggle. 

After the severe internal and external preparations, 
the history of which we have traced in the preceding 
pages, the most severe and important crisis of his 
development yet awaited Luther; the persevering 
resistance which the world, more especially in the 
form of the degraded papacy, opposed to him. He 
was now to become conscious of all the deductions to 
be drawn from the point of view he had attained in 
spiritual sense; he must now learn to build solely 
upon the truth thus recognised, upon religious prin- 
ciple so painfully acquired, instead of leaning on 
ecclesiastical authority in his slow but ever-increasing 
attempts at amendment. 

The struggle commenced with the point which had 
been the decisive saving one in Luther's spiritual life. 
While in the hands of an avaricious, worldly, and 
domineering priesthood and superstitious people, it 
had degenerated into a revolting scandal to the cause 
of religion. The point in question was nothing less 
than — how man might find the way to return from 
error and defilement to God, and obtain reconciliation 
with his Creator and Judge. It was, in fact, the 



182 



MARTIN LUTHER, 



AND THE 



craving of conscience for the remission of sins, for re- 
demption and atonement, — a longing for the effectual 
cure of the deepest ills of humanity, that gave to 
Luther's appearance before the world its great and 
abiding importance ; an importance we must not suffer 
the scholastic form and language in which the debate 
was for a long time carried on, to obscure. 

The answer Luther had found to the above all- 
important question was of a deeply spiritual and 
purely religious nature : The repentant return of the 
heart to God; unconditional humble confidence in free 
grace, in the love and mercy of God made man. The 
answer which, on the other hand, the church of Borne 
gave practically to this question was : For money you 
may purchase your peace with God ; in purchasing the 
letters of indulgence which the highest ecclesiastical 
authority, the pope himself, offers for sale from the 
treasury of his mercy, you can obtain forgiveness of 
sin. Such was the traffic in indulgences: a rich 
source of revenue for Rome. It thus teas understood 
by the people and extolled by the clerical dealers ; not- 
withstanding the zealous and learned attempts made 
by papists of later periods, to prove that the church 
never understood indulgences in this coarse sense. 
The fa ct remains uncontradicted, — that in the bosom 
of that church, forgiveness of sins tvas openly offered 
for sale in the name of her highest dignitary, and was 
actually sold in the form of letters of indulgence. 



REFORMATION 



IN GERMANY. 



183 



The estimate we form of the separation of the churches 
in the sixteenth century, as well as all attempts at 
understanding between earnest sincere Catholics and 
Protestants, must have its foundation in this astound- 
ing fact. It is no rhetorical exaggeration, but a literal 
fact, that in the original quarrel between Luther and 
Tetzel, the seller of indulgences, w T e have before us, 
as it w r ere, in striking contrast, Christ and Belial, 
God and Mammon. 

The first act of Luther and of the Reformation 
was, therefore, the raising of Christianity from its 
deep degeneration ; a troubled cry of the Christian con- 
science against tlie most revolting disfigurement and per- 
version of the religion of the Crucified: this is the 
imperishable glory of the 31st of October 1517, — the 
day on which Luther affixed his ninety-five theses, 
against the use of indulgences, on the church-doors at 
Wittenberg. 

The very first thesis opposes a radically different 
view r , drawn from moral and religious considerations, 
to the whole theory of penitence and absolution, as 
then maintained by the degenerate Christian religion 
of the priests : " When our Lord and Master Jesus 
Christ saith, ' Repent ye, &c, he wills that the whole 
life of his faithful people on earth shall be a continuous 

penitence And such word," the second thesis 

acids, "neither can nor must be understood to refer 
to the sacrament of penance, that is to say, of con- 



184 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



fession and absolution as administered by the priest." 
The thirty-second thesis declares still more boldly, 
" those persons who believe themselves sure of salva- 
tion through indulgences will go to the devil with 
their teachers." The assertion of the thirty-sixth 
thesis, that " every Christian who feels true repentance 
and sorrow for sins has entire forgiveness, without 
letters of indulgence," was already essentially a re- 
jection of the whole hierarchical edifice. In the 
thirty-seventh it is said, " every true Christian, living 
or dead, partakes in all the blessings of Christ and of 
the church as the gift of God, without any indulgences." 
In the forty-third and forty-fourth also : " Christians 
must be taught that it is better to give to the poor, or 
lend to those in want, than to purchase indulgences : 
for by works of love, love increaseth, and man 
becometh more holy; but by indulgences he does not 
get better, but only more confident and free from 

suffering and punishment Christians ought to 

be taught," he says further, "that the pope's indul- 
gence is well enough so long as it is not relied on (49. 
. . . Trust in indulgences for salvation is false and 
worthless, even though the commissary, nay the pope 

himself should pledge his oivn soul on it (52) 

The treasures of the church, out of which the pope 
grants indulgences, are neither sufficiently defined nor 
well enough known to the community of Christ (56). 
.... The true real treasure of the church is the holy 
Gospel of the glory and grace of God (62)." 



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In this way the warfare began, the coarse of which, 
with all its details, has been already so often related, 
that we may confine ourselves to pointing out those 
which refer to the most prominent and important 
changes. 

However bold and impressive the language of these 
theses, Luther himself had no idea at that time of 
the flame he would kindle by their means : his spirit, 
still painfully wavering between the authority of the 
Scriptures and of the church, would perhaps have 
trembled and drawn back, could he then have fore- 
seen all the consequences of this first step. His mind 
for several years longer continued to struggle between 
freedom of judgment and humility: zeal for the faith 
and piety, conscience and increased knowledge, urged 
on a rupture ; reverence and the obedience in which 
he had been brought up inclined him to peace with 
Rome. 

He himself characterises his mental history during 
the first years of the struggle in words most worthy 
of consideration : " I had got singly and through 
imprudence into this dispute ; and as I could not 
draw back, I not only gave way to the pope in many 
important articles, but willingly and very honestly 
reverenced him. For who was I, a miserable, despised 
monk, then more resembling a corpse than a living 
man, that I should oppose myself to the majesty of 
the pope? Those self-confident spirits, who after- 



186 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

wards attacked the pope with great pride and pre- 
sumption, know but little of the sufferings and in- 
flictions which my heart experienced during the first 
and second year; and of the not pretended or imagi- 
nary, but real humility in which I then lived. I, 
who stuck fast in the road, was not so cheerful or so 
confident of my case ; for then I was ignorant of many 
things which now I know, thank God ! I only carried 
on the dispute, and was eager to be taught; but as I 
could not derive sufficient instruction from the works 
of the dead nor from the dull teachers, that is to say, 
from the writings of the theologians and jurists, I 
sought for advice from the living, and to hear the 
church of God itself. There I found indeed many 
pious men much pleased with my propositions ; but at 
that time I deemed it impossible to recognise and 
acknowledge them as members of the church imbued 
with the Holy Ghost, and looked solely to the pope, 
cardinals, bishops, theologians, jurists, monks, and 
priests. From them I looked for the Holy Ghost; for 
I had so eagerly adopted their doctrine, that it stupified 
me, and I knew r not whether I w T as awake or asleep. 
Only when, by the help of the Scriptures, I had got 
over all the arguments which opposed me, I did at 
length, by the grace of God, and with much anxiety, 
trouble, and labour, overcome the last, — namely, that 
we ought to hear the church. For I believed the pope's 
church to be the true church much more seriously and 



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reverently than those shameful perverters who praise 
the pope's church so highly, in opposition to my views." 

The above observations furnish a key to many ex- 
pressions of entire subjection which he was still able 
to make use of while addressing the pope. When he 
forwarded to Leo X., through Staupitz, the treatise for 
the establishment and further extension of his theses 
(resolvtiones or probationes), he addressed him at the 
conclusion of his letter in terms which astonish us, as 
coming from one who subsequently declared the pope 
to be Antichrist : " Therefore, most holy father, I 
throw myself at the feet of your holiness, and resign 
myself to you, with all that I am and possess. Let 
your holiness deal with me according to your 
pleasure. It rests with your holiness to agree or to 
differ from my statement ; to declare me to be either 
right or wrong; to grant me life or to take it away. 
Let the consequence be what it may, I will acknow- 
ledge that the voice of your holiness is the voice of 
Christ, who acteth and speaketh through it. If I 
have merited death, I shall not refuse to die ; for the 
earth is the Lord's, and all that is in it : praise be to 
him for ever and ever !" 

The arrogant and vehement literary conflict begun 
against him by Sylvester Prierias, a Dominican of 
Rome, Dr. John Eck at Ingoldstadt, and Jacob Hoog- 
straaten at Cologne, notorious as the judge of heretics, 
with their scholastic weapons, was only the prelude 



188 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

to more serious proceedings. He was cited to Rome 
to defend himself ; but obtained, through princely 
interest, the favour of a hearing in Germany. He 
believed that before Cardinal Cajetan de Yio, the 
pope's legate in Germany, he might appeal success- 
fully, not only to the holy Scriptures and to common 
sense, but also to the fathers and to decrees, to prove 
the justice of his theses. He firmly declined to re- 
cant ; and saved himself from violence, and perhaps 
assassination, only by a sudden and secret departure 
(Oct, 20, 1518). 

It was uncertain, some time after his return, 
whether he would be allowed to remain at Wittenberg, 
or be compelled to eat the bread of sorrow as a home- 
less wanderer, to languish in prison, or die upon the 
scaffold. These were the days of his spiritual 
heroism ; the grandest in history, if we estimate 
grandeur by sublimity of character. Even before 
the examination at Augsburg, he was resigned to all 
that might befall him : " If they execute my poor 
body," he wrote to Staupitz, " by violence or treachery, 
they deprive me only of a few hours. I have satis- 
faction for all this in my sweet Redeemer and Medi- 
ator, whom I will praise as long as I live." After 
his hearing, he thought of going to Paris, if his elector 
could or would not protect him : u I daily expect the 
anathema from Rome; therefore I put every thing in 
readiness, that I may be guided and prepared to go, 




LUTHER BEFORE THE POPE'S LEGATE, 



! 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 189 

with Abraham, I know not whither; but I go in 
perfect security, because God is every where." 

He saw that he had entered on a career where 
standing still was impossible, and where he had no 
choice left but cowardly to recede, contrary to the 
dictates of his conscience, or advance boldly against 
Home. " If I remain here," he wrote on the 2nd of 
December 1518 (at Wittenberg), "I shall be deprived 
of liberty of speech and writing; but if I leave, I 
may resign all, and sacrifice my life to Christ." He 
wrote his appeal to a council to be convened hereafter, 
and received permission from the Elector Frederick to 
remain at Wittenberg. The movement once begun, 
it continued to ferment mightily in his mind : " My 
pen is pregnant with greater matters ; I know not 
myself whence these thoughts arise in me ; it is my 
opinion, that this matter is not as yet properly 
begun." 

Soon afterwards a skilful attempt was made from 
the other side to touch those chords in Luther's mind 
which might attune him to subjection to ecclesiastical 
authority. His piety and reverence, innate and 
acquired, for the existing authorities of the church of 
Eome, for tradition and history ; his dread of the im- 
pending schism, and the awful responsibility it 
involved, — made him easily accessible to the remon- 
strances of a dexterous papal envoy, Charles Miltitz 
the Saxon (Jan. 1519). The cunning policy of the 



190 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

nuncio, already intimidated and disposed to mild 
measures by the expression of public opinion in Ger- 
many against Rome, nearly succeeded in swaying the 
obnoxious doctor of Altenburg. It went so far, that 
Luther declared himself willing to admonish every 
one to obedience to the church of Eome; and at the 
same time to confess that he had declared the truth 
with too much warmth, and perhaps at the wrong 
time ; he also promised to write humbly to the pope, 
and to be thenceforth entirely silent upon the points 
that had been debated, provided his opponents 
observed silence likewise. " I bear witness," he wrote 
to Leo X., March 3rd, 1519, "before God and his 
creatures, that I never intended, nor do this day 
intend, — that I never seriously proposed to attack the 
power of the church of Rome and of your holiness in 
any way, or to detract from it by craftiness. Yes, I 
freely bear witness that the power of this church 
stands above all ; and that nothing in heaven or on 
earth should be preferred before her, save Jesus 
Christ, Lord over all." 

In the pamphlet intended for the instruction and 
pacification of the people, " Dr. Martin Luther's 
Exposition of several Articles which have been pointed 
out and ascribed to him by his unfriends," he cautions 
his readers in the most decisive terms against separa- 
tion from Rome: "'Although things in Rome might 
well be better, still neither this nor any other reason 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 191 

is great enough to cause us to tear ourselves away or 
separate from the church. Indeed, the worse it is, 
the more we ought to run and cling to it ; for schism 
and contempt will not mend it. . . . Nor ought we to 
forsake God for the sake of the devil." 

Thus it appeared as if the religious and spiritual 
movement which, at a later period, became the very 
soul of modern history, was to exhaust itself at its 
source ; or, as Luther himself says, " bleed to death." 
Or may we conclude that even without Luther, or in 
despite of him, the movement, once begun, would 
have continued and reached its object? To such 
questions we have no other answers than suppositions 
according to analogies ; the more important fact for 
us is, that Luther was not silent, as he had first 
intended. 

Dr. Eck gave occasion for the fresh outbreak by the 
publication of theses which he meant *to defend at 
Leipzic against Luther's colleague Karlstadt. Luther 
saw himself attacked in them ; and set up against 
Eck's assertion of the permanent supremacy of the 
church of Rome the counter thesis, that this supre- 
macy was founded only upon papal decrees issued 
during the last four hundred years, in contradiction 
to the accredited history of eleven hundred years, 
and against the text of the Word of God, and against 
the Council of Nice. In the midst of the historical 
and exegetical studies with which he prepared himself 



102 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

for the disputations at Leipzic (27th of June to 13th 
of July, 1510), it appeared as if the Scriptures and 
history left him only the doubt as to " whether the 
pope was Antichrist himself, or only his apostle ?" 
This was said in confidence to Spalatin ; in his 
writings at that time he still expressed himself with 
much greater prudence ; for instance, in his epistle to 
the Galatians : " 1 give the highest honour to the 
Roman bishop and his decrees, above which there is 
none other ; and I except no one but the sovereign of 
this vicegerent, Jesus Christ, his Lord and the Lord 
of us all." But when he declares here, that he would 
examine the word and the work of the vicegerent hy 
the tvord of Christ, he places himself, in fact, already 
above papal authority, by asserting the right of appeal 
to a higher spiritual authority. Thus he had already 
taken the position of Evangelical Protestantism, 
before the name of Protestant was known. The con- 
fidence of his soul at this time is breathed forth in 
the words to Spalatin : " The truth will be maintained 
by its own right hand, not by mine, nor thine ; nor 
any man's hand." 

■ The most important result of the Leipzic disputa- 
tions was, that Luther maintained against Eck the 
idea of "Jesus Christ only being the head of the 
church militant, and that the pope held the primacy 
only by human and not by divine right." And when 
he did not shrink from the conclusion, " that some of 



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103 



the articles of Huss and the Bohemians were Christian 
and evangelical," he stepped beyond the boundaries 
of the authority of the councils. His new evangelical 
view of the importance of the laity, so called, was 
made clear in the demand that at the Universities of 
Paris and Erfurt, appointed to arbitrate in the dispu- 
tations at Leipzic, all the faculties, and not the faculty 
of divinity alone, should have votes. Although he 
behaved so boldly at Leipzic, he yet felt afterwards 
astonished that he could have ascribed so much 
authority to the pope : " Now see and learn, Christian 
reader, by my case, how difficult it is to cast off and 
get free from such errors as the whole world confirms 
by its example, and which by long habit have become 
second nature." 

An eye-witness of the disputations at Leipzic, 
Petrus Mosellanus, gives the following description of 
Luther as he appeared at that time: "Martin is of 
middle height, and so much worn with care and study, 
that one might count all his bones, if one saw him 
near. His voice is clear and piercing, his learning 
and knowledge of the Scriptures admirable ; when 
speaking, he is never at a loss for matter or expression. 
Civil and kindly, neither gloomy nor proud in 
company, he is always self-possessed, and shows a 
cheerful face whatever his enemies may plot against 
him. They approach him generally with one thing 
only, that in rebuking others he is more inconsiderate 

10 
o 



194 



M A RT .IN LUTHER, AND THE 



and severe than becomes a theological reformer, or 
indeed any theologian." 

After the disputations at Leipzic, Luther once more 
exchanged the two-edged sword of oral preaching for 
the pen, in polemical writings against the Franciscans, 
against Emser. Even thus early the Bohemians 
addressed to him the encouraging words : " What Huss 
once was for Bohemia, that art thou, Martin Luther, 
for Saxony." 

Luther's position became again as uncertain and 
insecure (from the autumn of 1519 until the summer 
of 1520) as in the winter of 1518, after the examina- 
tion at Augsburg. On the 14th of January, 1520, he 
wrote : " I have given up and resigned myself to the 
Lord. His will be done ! Who has asked him to 
make a doctor of me ? But having made me one, let 
him protect me, or destroy me, if he repent him of it. 
This temptation does not frighten me at all." To the 
warnings of his friend Spalatin, who became alarmed 
at the increasing number of his enemies at the elec- 
toral court, he replied : " There is no fear that thou 
shouldst become too clever, any more than that I 
should become too silly. If thou think justly of the 
Gospel, thou canst not expect that this should end 
without offence, noise, and revolt. Thou canst not 
change the sword into a feather, or war into peace. 
God's word itself is sword, war, overthrow, offence. 
God carries me away with him ; let him see what he 



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can make of me : for I have the certain conviction 
that in all this I have sought and prayed for nothing 
of my own impulse, — it hath been wrung from me by 
the wrath of others. Be of good courage, and heed 
not what is visible ; faith is the foundation of what we 

do not see I seek nothing. Whether I stand 

or fall, I lose nothing, and I gain nothing." 

No one could speak thus, who had not thrown him- 
self with his whole soul into a great and holy cause, 
and identified himself with all its cares and hopes. 
Such words of Christian heroism as the above belong 
to the most sublime part of Luther's life ; they out- 
weigh, if justly and truly recorded, and regarded with 
sympathy for what is holy in man's nature, all his 
faults and imperfections. When he saw his writings 
condemned by the universities of Cologne and Lou- 
vaine, his enemies at court increase in number and 
virulence, nay even his life threatened by assassins, 
he prepared for expatriation ; many times he was 
ready to retreat to Bohemia for concealment. " I am 
ever willing to be silent," he writes, July 9th 1520, 
u if they will not attempt to silence the truth of the Gospel. 
They may obtain any thing from me, nay I will give 
all of my own free will, so they leave tlie vmy of salva- 
tion free to Christians I want no cardinal's 

hat, nor gold ; nothing of all that they hold dearest 
at Rome. But if I cannot obtain this, they may take 
from me my office, and let me live and die solitary in 
a corner." 



196 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



The encouraging address of the Franconian knights, 
Ulrich von Hutten and Sylvester von Schauenburg, 
fell upon him like lightning in the very midst of his 
uncertainty. Already, in the beginning of the year 
1520, Hutten had secretly, through Melanchthon, 
offered the protection of Francis von Sickingen ; he 
now wrote (June 4) : " It is said that ye are outlawed 
and excommunicated. Oh, how blessed are you, 
Luther ! what a happy man are you ! for of you all 
God-fearing hearts will say and sing, ' They take arms 
against the soul of the righteous, and condemn inno- 
cent blood; but the Lord will repay them for their 
unrighteousness.' What a misfortune and affliction 
would it bring upon all Christianity, if you were now 
to fall away !" In the letter from Sylvester von 
Schauenburg (June 11th), he was entreated not to 
fly into Bohemia, if the elector should withdraw his 
protection; "for I, and, as I think, an hundred of 
the nobility, whom, please God, I mean to raise, will 
stand faithfully by you, and will protect you against 
all danger from your enemies, as long as your opinions 
are unrefuted by a general Christian assembly, or by 
trustworthy and sensible judges, or you be better in- 
structed." 

These letters had an influence upon Luther not 
easily to be mistaken, freeing him gradually from all 
considerations for the elector and the university : 

The die is cast ; the favour or wrath of the Romish 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



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party is despised. I will never be reconciled to them, 
nor have any thing in common with them. Let them 
condemn and burn my books ! I, in return, will con- 
demn and publicly burn the whole papal law, this 
many-headed dragon of heresies : and there shall be 
an end to that humiliation which I have hitherto 
endured and exhibited in vain." 

In the summer and autumn of the same year 
(1520), three addresses were written, containing the 
signal for the Reformation in its first freshness, en- 
titled : " To the Christian nobility of the German 
Nation;" " Of the Babylonian Captivity of the 
Church;" "On the Liberty of the Christian." Who- 
ever wishes to become acquainted with the guiding 
and impelling principle of the spiritual struggle in 
Germany against Rome in its original form, must 
refer again and again to these most important docu- 
ments, which prove the yet unsubdued demand for 
reformation. 

One day, Luther, while travelling with Lorenz 
Suess, exclaimed while he rose from prayer : " Now T 
have charged my gun; if it go off well, it must take 
effect. I will write an address to the German 
nobility; if that succeed, and they hear the word of 
God, you shall see what will come of it !" The little 
treatise, the design of which was then first conceived 
in his mind, was no other than his " Address to the 
Christian Nobility of the German Nation concerning 



198 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



the Amendment of the Christian Estate" (July). 
This was a step of incalculable importance ; for by it 
he called upon the laity (deemed unworthy in the 
Romish view) for assistance against the hierarchical 
system, that he might bring about the necessary re- 
formation in the affairs of the church, notwithstand- 
ing the opposition of Rome and its priests, by means 
of public opinion and the powerful co-operation of the 
people. " The time for silence is past," he says, in 
his dedication to Nicholaus von Amsdorf, " and the 
time for speaking has come." He meant to try 
" whether God would help his church by means of 
the laity; since the clergy, to whom the task more 
properly belonged, had become wholly indifferent." 

In the introduction he addresses himself to the 
emperor and the nobility, warning them not to begin 
by trusting in their own power and understanding. 
Former emperors had, perhaps, been overcome in 
their struggles against the popes, for the very reason 
that they had relied upon their own power rather 
than on God ; because (we may say) they defended a 
political principle rather than a religious one. " We 
must here, despairing of earthly power, attack the 

enemy with humble trust in God and keep 

before our eyes only the distressed condition of Chris- 
tianity. Without this, the beginning might be pro 
mi sing; but as we proceed, the evil principle will 
create such a confusion, that the whole world ma}/ 



REFORMATION IN GERMAN Y. 



199 



swim in blood, and yet no good ensue." Here we 
have, on the threshold of the revolution, the sober 
wisdom of the true reformer, who does not seek to 
enforce by violence a spiritual principle; he does not 
seek to attain a pure object by impure means, by 
enlisting vulgar and selfish impulses in its cause. 

His view of the Romish system, and his attack on 
it, were based on three leading ideas : " The Roman- 
ists have thrown up three bulwarks, behind which 
they have hitherto intrenched themselves so well, 
that no one hath been able to reform them. 

" 1. That temporal power has no right over them; 
that spiritual is superior to temporal power. 

" 2. No one but the pope may interpret the Scrip- 
tures. 

"3. No one but the pope can convene a council." 

While attacking this triple spiritual bulwark of 
popery, he is deeply impressed with the fact, that he 
is entering on one of the most memorable spiritual 
battles in the history of the world : " Now, God help 
us, and give us one of those trumpets by which the 
walls of Jericho were overthrown, that we may also 
overthrow with a blast those walls of straw or paper, 
and set free the rod of Christian truth for the punish- 
ment of sinners, and expose to the light of day the 
cunning and deceit of the devil!" The most powerful 
spiritual influences were brought to bear upon these 
three bulwarks; to principles he opposed principles, to 



200 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

ancient worn-out conceptions he opposed new ones, 
whose freshness was hailed with sympathy by the 
nation. When Rome appealed to the sovereignty of 
the church over the state, Luther addressed the 
patriotic spirit of the peoples, the now-matured con- 
sciousness of political dignity and independence, and 
the spiritual and religious importance of the Christian 
state. When Rome claimed for the pope the exclusive 
right to interpret the Scriptures, Luther rejected all 
submission of the original Christian religion to human 
arbitration, and insisted on the right to individual 
religious opinion and liberty. And when the pope, 
in the third of the above propositions, reserved to 
himself the prerogative of convening a councii, 
Luther regarded this as a mere tyrannical attempt to 
deprive the church of some of its original and in- 
alienable rights. 

While attacking that "first bulwarkVf Romanism," 
he rises to the sublime idea of evangelical Protest- 
antism, so rich in consequences, to the recognition of 
the common priesthood of Christians ; the idea which 
contains in itself an inexhaustible supply of the re- 
formatory elements for all future ages, and either 
renders the relapse of Christianity into hierarchical 
apathy impossible, or at least always assures it the 
victory again. u All Christians are truly of priestly 
rank, and admit of no distinction, unless arising from 
office For baptism, the gospel, and faith only, 



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make Christians and priests. The pope's anointing, 
the tonsure, ordaining and consecrating, may make 
hypocrites and noodles, but never can make a man a 
Christian or spiritual. For by baptism we are all 
consecrated priests." With this idea the emancipation 
of coming times was pronounced ; the torch was 
lighted which was to guide a new period, and which, 
in its turn, has preserved the blessed right to freedom 
of conscience. Every subsequent effort for free 
spiritual progress and vital religion has emanated 
from this conviction; and the great day at Worms 
was, in fact, only the public assertion of this grand 
principle. 

When Luther asserted what follows, it was his 
object to destroy at the very root all false priestly 
pretensions : " If there were no higher consecration 
in us than that which pope or bishop confers, priests 
would never be made by the consecration of pope or 
bishops ; and to speak still more clearly, if a small 
body of pious Christian laity placed in a wilderness, 
without a priest consecrated by a bishop, were to agree 
among themselves and appoint one, whether married 
or not, to baptize, read masses, absolve, and preach, 
he would be as truly a priest as if the pope and all 
the bishops had consecrated him. Therefore, a priest- 
hood among Christians must be only official : because 
he holds office, he has precedence; as soon as he is 
deposed, he is a peasant or a citizen like others." 



202 



MARTIN LUTHER. 



AND T II E 



The idea of a common priesthood necessarily leads 
to a higher spiritual conception of the state and all 
moral actions and endeavours ; the state, as well as 
the general moral development of human nature, was 
looked upon and esteemed as an element of Christi- 
anity, as an essential portion of the kingdom of 
heaven : " We all are one body, of which Jesus 
Christ is the head ; every one is a member of the other. 
Christ has not hvo bodies, or two sorts of bodies, one 
temporal and the other spiritual. He is one head, and 

It as one body Therefore should the temporal 

Christian power exercise its office freely and un- 
hindered, not heeding whether the individual it 
attacks be pope, bishop, or priest. What the ecclesi- 
astical law hath said against this, is the pure invention 
of Romish presumption. Temporal (political) power 
has become part or a member of the Christian body ; 
and although its functions be temporal, yet is its 
nature spiritual." 

The second bulwark of the church of Rome, "that 
she had alone had the right to interpret the Scriptures," 
Luther overthrows by those unequivocal declarations 
of Holy Writ which emphatically represent the indi- 
vidual spirit of Christianity, the right to freedom of 
conscience : " ' Every Christian is taught of God.' 
' He that is spiritual judges all things.' 6 We have all 
one spirit of faith.' These and many other texts 
should make us courageous and free, and prevent our 



REFORMATION IN G E R 31 ANY. 



203 



suffering the spirit of liberty, as St. Paul calls it, to 
be frightened away by the inventions of the popes; 
but lead us freely to judge all they do or cause to be 
done, by our believing knowledge .of the Scriptures; 
and force them also to be quieted, not by their own 

understanding, but by a better If God spoke to 

a prophet by the mouth of an ass, why should he not 
speak now to a pope by the mouth of a pious man ? 
.... Therefore it behoves every Christian to stand by 
the faith." 

The third Romish bulwark, " that the pope alone is 
empowered to call a council, or confirm its decrees," 
must fall of itself, after the overthrow of the other 
two : " For if the pope act contrary to the Scriptures, 
we are bound to stand by the Scriptures, and to 
correct him according to the word of Christ (Matt, 
xviii. 15-17). If I am to complain of him before the 
community, I must first call it together There- 
fore, if necessity command, and the pope give offence 
to Christendom, he that is most capable, as a faithful 
member of the whole body, shall take steps for the 
convening of a truly free council. Nothing can effect 
this so well as the temporal Sword: particularly as the 
laity are now Christians and priests equally with us; 
spiritual and powerful in all things like ourselves; 
and are to discharge their office and their work, which 

God hath appointed, freely towards every one 

There is no power in the church except for amendment : 



204 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



if the pope, therefore, seeks to use his power of inter- 
ference with a free council, to prevent such amend- 
ment of the church, we must not regard him or his 
power; and should he thunder out excommunications 
and curses, we must despise it, as the proceeding of a 
madman, and excommunicate Mm in Ms turn, in full 
reliance upon God. 

" In this way, I hope, the false and lying threats 
with which the church of Eome has for a long time 
intimidated us, will be repelled, and it, like ourselves, 
be subject to temporal authority; and be no longer 
suffered to interpret the Scriptures without skill, and 
so as to do violence to their true meaning; nor have 
power to prevent the calling together of councils. 
And if she do so, she is truly of the community of 
Antichrist and of the devil, having nothing of Christ 
but the name." 

His practical propositions in this treatise tend prin- 
cipally to the confiscation of all the papal revenues, 
and depriving the pope of all jurisdiction over the 
emperor. In connexion with these two points he 
also insists upon the limitation of monastic orders, 
the abolition of celibacy among the clergy, and the 
reform of the system of indulgences and of universi- 
ties and schools. 

A few months afterwards (in the beginning of 
October) appeared " The little book of the Babylonian 
Captivity of the Church," in which he attacked 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 205 

another main pillar of the Roman Catholicism of the 
middle ages, — the doctrine of the seven sacraments. 
He states energetically and positively, in the very 
outset of this work, that it was the real necessity 
of the case, and the insufficiency of the opposing 
arguments, which led him by one discovery after 
another, further and further from Rome : u Whether 
I will or no, I am made more learned day by day." 
The whole outward form of the church as then exist- 
ing, more particularly the idea of a separate and 
exclusively privileged priesthood, rested upon the 
Catholic doctrine of the sacraments : to attack that 
doctrine was, therefore, tantamount to questioning the 
entire form of Catholicism; and Luther did not con- 
ceal from himself the vast range of this undertaking : 
" I presume to meddle with a weighty matter, which 
it may not perhaps be possible to overthrow; because, 
having been confirmed by long usage, and received by 
common assent, it is so completely interwoven with 
all, that the greater number of the books now 
accredited, nay the whole form of the church, must be 
put aside and changed, and an entirely different code of 
ceremonies he introduced or re-established. But my 
Saviour liveth : and we must give greater heed to the 
word of God than to the thoughts of men and angels." 
He recognised only the three sacraments common to 
all Christians — baptism, communion, and penance — 
as founded on the word of Christ, and therefore 



206 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND 



THE 



binding and necessary; — another progressive step 
towards the self-liberation of the church from the 
" Babylonian captivity" of priestly dominion and of 
the levitical Romish ordinances ; a victorious step 
towards the liberation of spiritual Christianity from 
the perishable and oppressive form with which it had 
been gradually invested. 

Shortly afterwards (in the middle of October), the 
third of these impressive writings, in which Luther's 
warfare with Rome was carried on, made its appear- 
ance — the discourse " On the Liberty of the Christian." 
He explains a Christian liberty as dominion over and 
servitude under all things : dominion, because through 
faith we receive communion with the Lord of all 
things ; and servitude, because love impels us to serve 
all our brethren. According to his divine nature 
(that is Luther's idea), man is above all wants, 
except God and his word ; the certainty of an eternal 
worth and a blessed existence alone constitute his 
true nourishment. According to his material nature, 
on the contrary, he is allied to the dust, of which he 
can free himself only through love and communion. 
All material possession is given us only to assist our 
neighbour with it in true love, "because every one 
has sufficient for himself in his faith." This is the 
language of a most noble religious idealism : only he 
who knows and loves the spiritual and eternal good 
is raised above temporal good, and has power to look 



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upon and treat all earthly things merely as the means 
and instruments of love. "Nothing external can 
make the spiritual man free or pious ; none of these 
things reach the soul, either to make it free or to 

enslave it, to make it good or had We must thus 

be convinced that the soul may dispense with all 
things, except the word of God ; and without the 
word of God, no other thing is of use. . . . And 
Christ has come for no other end but to preach the 
word of God. Also the apostles, bishops, priests, and 
all the clergy have been called and instituted solely 
for the sake of the word, — although now, alas ! things 
are different. But if thou askest, • Which is the word 
that giveth such exceeding mercy, and how shall I 
use it?' — answer: It is nothing else but the teaching 
of Christ which is contained in the Gospel; which is 
expressed and carried out in such a way, that thou 
nearest, as it were, thy God speak to thee, saying that 
all thy life and thy works are as nothing before him, 
but that thou must eternally perish with all that is 
in thee. The which, if thou truly believest, will 
make thee doubt thyself. .... But that thou mayest 
be rid of all that is of thee and in thee, — that is to 
say, thy corruption, — God setteth before thee his 
beloved Son, Jesus Christ, and tells thee through his 
living and consoling word, thou shalt resign thyself 
to him with steadfast faith, and sincerely trust in him. 
Then, for the sake of that faith, shall all thy sins be 



208 



M A R T I N LUTHER, A N D THE 



forgiven thee, all thy corruption conquered; thou 
shalt be just, true, pious, free from all things; and all 

commandments shall be fulfilled In faith, thou 

possessest all things ; without faith, thou hast none. 
. . . Such as the word is, such the spirit becometh through 
it ; even as iron becometh fiery red like fire through con- 
tact icith it. . . . That is Christian liberty, — the only 
faith which doth not cause us to live idly or do evil, 
but simply teaches we need no works to obtain holi- 
ness and salvation Not only cloth faith give so 

much, that it makes the soul like the divine word; 
but it also unites the soul icith Christ, as a bride with 
her bridegroom : from which union it results that 
Christ and the soul become one, and that the posses- 
sions of both, in despite of the fall (Fall oder Unfall), 
become common between them: that which Christ 
possesses becometh the property of the believing 
soul ; what the soul hath is Christ's. So all the 
possessions and blessedness of Christ are the soul's. 
So Christ takes upon himself all the sins and vices of 
the soul. Hence springs the blessed antagonism that 

Christ is God and man As he taketh upon him- 

'self the sins of the believing soul through the 
wedding-ring, that is to say, through faith ; so must all 

sins be drowned and absorbed in him For his 

triumphant righteousness is too strong for all sins. 
.... Therefore is faith only the righteousness of man, 
and the keeping all the commandments; for whoever 



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fulfilleth the first principal commandment — 6 Thou 
shalt honour thy God' — keeps assuredly and easily all 
other commandments. : . . . This is nothing else hit 
the piety of the heart ; this is the head and the 'whole 

being of holiness Now from all this it follows, 

that a Christian lives not for himself only, but in 
Christ and in his neighbour; in Christ through faith, 
in his neighbour through love. Through faith he 
rises above himself in God ; from God he descends 
again below himself through love, and yet remains 
ever in God and divine love. Behold, this is true 
Christian liberty ! — which surpasses all other liberty 
as much as heaven surpasses earth." 

The above passages regarding faith and the word it 
was necessary to give at length, in order to obtain a 
clear perception of what is characteristic and decided 
in Luther's peculiar views. These peculiar views in 
the spirit of the Apostle Paul and of the Father 
Augustin were for him the imperfect utterance of the 
(to us all) inexpressible and inconceivable mystery 
of divine grace. We repeat, this was his manner of 
expressing himself, which we may confidently adapt 
to our own wants and experiences, if our comprehen- 
sion of the Scriptures, of our own heart, and of the 
ways of God in history, lead us to explain to our- 
selves the mystery of divine love and mercy in other 
combinations and in other images and comparisons. 
The essential point which Luther strove in his 
14 



210 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

language to make most emphatic, was ever only the 
consoling idea of free unmerited grace, which extends 
salvation and blessedness to hi-m who resigns himself 
in penitence and faith ; it was therefore, above all 
things, that view of Christianity which gives rest and 
peace to an awakened conscience, and seeks all that 
is most holy in religion in the inmost experience of 
the heart. 

II. The Kupture. 

"While Luther was writing these three important 
treatises, the bull against him had already been issued 
at Eome, but without his knowledge. Before he saw 
it, he had been prevailed upon by Miltitz to make one 
more attempt at conciliation. In October 1520, after 
Dr.* Eck had begun publishing the papal bull in 
Saxony, Luther once again wrote to Leo X., to 
whom he had dedicated (under date Sept. 6, antedating 
five weeks, that he might ignore the bull) his treatise 
" On the Liberty of a Christian." " I bring with me 
a little book," he says in his letter, u as a token of 
good will and beginning of peace, by which your 
holiness will perceive how I would wish to proceed, if 
your unchristian flatterers would allow me. It is a 
very little book, and yet is the whole sum of a Chris- 
tian life contained in it, if the true sense be under- 
stood." 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 211 

Tn this remarkable letter Luther draws a clear dis- 
tinction between the pope as an individual and the 
papal chair or cure. " Indeed, your reputation and 
the fame of your life are so renowned all over the 
world, through the reports of many most learned 

men, that no one would venture to attack you 

Therefore I pray, holy father Leo, that thou wouldst 
accept my apology, and look upon me as one who 
never intended thee any harm, and wishes thee all 

that is good In all things I would willingly 

give way to others ; but the word of God I can and 

will not forsake or deny But it is true I have 

boldly attacked the Koman see, which is called the 
court of Rome ; of wmich thou thyself must acknow- 
ledge that it is worse and more infamous than ever a 
Sodom and Gomorrah or Babylon was. And, as far 
as I can observe, its corruption is not to be cured or 
amended ; everything about it hath become desperate 
and beyond conception. Therefore I felt vexed that 
they should deceive and injure poor people every 
where in thy name, and under the cloak of the church 
of Borne. This I have opposed, and will continue to 
oppose as long as a Christian spirit lives within me. 

. . . For it is not concealed from thee thyself, how 
for many past years nothing but corruption of soul, 
body, and property, and the most injurious examples 
of evil-doing, have gone out into the world from 
Rome ; through which the church of Rome, which in 



212 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



former times was most holy, has now become a pit 
of destruction beyond all pits of destruction, a den of 
thieves beyond all dens of thieves, the head and 
front of sin, death, and damnation • so that one could 
scarcely conceive any increase of wickedness, even if 
Antichrist himself were to come. 

"In the meantime thou, holy father Leo, sittest 
like a sheep among the wolves, like Daniel in the 
lions' den, like Ezekiel among the scorpions. What 
canst thou do alone among so many savage monstrosi- 
ties {wilder Wuncler) ? And if three or four learned 
and pious cardinals were to stand by thee, how little 
is that among such swarms ! Ye would be destroyed 
by poisori, ere ye could begin to amend the matter. 
There is an end of the Roman see. . . . The wrath of 
God hath fallen upon it unceasingly. . . . That is 
the cause w T hy I have ever been sorry that thou hast 
at this time become pope, thou pious Leo, who 
mightest have been worthy of this office in better 
times. The papal chair is not worthy of thee now ; 
ra.ther should the spirit of evil be pope, which indeed 
ruleth more than thou dost in Babylon. If St. 
Bernard laments over his Pope Eugenius, when the 
papal chair still ruled with good hopes of amendment, 
how much more should we lament over thee, because 
in the last three hundred years corruption and folly 
have irremediably gained ground ! Is it not true that 
there is nothing worse under the wide heavens, 



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nothing more pestilential or odious, than the court of 
Rome ? 

" See, then, my lord and father, the reason why I 
have so roughly handled this pestilential chair; 
indeed, I have been in hopes that I should merit thy 
grace and thanks for attacking thy prison, nay thy 

hell, so vigorously and boldly It would never 

have entered my heart to act angrily against the 
court of Rome ; for seeing that it could not be 
amended, I have despised it; have therefore given 
myself up to the quiet, peaceful study of the Scrip- 
tures, that I might become useful to those among 
whom I dwell. As in this I did not prove unsuccess- 
ful, the spirit of evil opened his eyes and became 
aware of it; he quickly, in foolish ambition, roused 
up the distinguished enemy of Christ and of truth, 
in his servant John Eck, and inspired him that he 
should draw me unawares into a disputation, and en- 
snare me in some expression which might accidentally 
escape me against the papacy." 

After having explained how he had been drawn 
more and more deeply into the opposition to Romish 
abuses by Eck and Cardinal Cajetan, — although he 
would much rather have pursued "quieter and more 
useful studies," — he once more, according to the pro- 
positions of Miltitz, attempts a compromise with the 
pope : u Therefore I now approach, holy father Leo, 
and at thy feet I pray that thou wilt, if possible, 



214 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

bridle thy flatterers, who are the enemies of peace 
and yet cry out for peace. Recant my doctrine I neve? 
will ; nor let any one attempt to make me, unless he 
wish to throw the matter into still greater confusion. 
Nor will I endure rule or limit in the interpretation of 
Scripture; because the word of God, which teaches 
true liberty, neither shall nor ought to be constrained. 
If these two points be granted me, there can be nothing 
else proposed which I will not do and suffer with 
all my heart. I am an enemy to strife ; I do not wish 
to excite or stir up any one ; but if I be stirred up, I 
shall not be silent either with tongue or pen. Your 
holiness may, ivith a few easy short tvords, put an end 
to all these vehement disputes, and command silence and 
peace. 

" Then do not listen to those who sing sweetly in 
thine ear; who say that thou art not a mere man, but 
blended with God. . . . Thou art a servant of all the 
servants of God, and in a more dangerous position 
than any other man on earth. Be not deceived by 
those who lie and dissemble to thee, saying thou art 
master of the world ; and who deem no one a Chris- 
tian, unless he be subject to thee; who prate as if 
thou hadst power in heaven, in hell, and in purgatory. 
They are thine enemies, and seek to destroy thy soul. 
... They are all in error who say that thou standest 
above the council and the body of Christendom, they 
err who attribute to thee exclusively the power to 



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interpret the Scriptures In short, believe no 

one who extols thee, but only those who humiliate 
thee. That is God's will." 

Could Luther seriously believe in the possibility of 
producing any effect upon the pope by words such as 
these ? Such a supposition can, at all events, be 
accounted for only by complete ignorance and an 
over-estimate of Leo X.'s vigour and stability of 
character. It was, in fact, expecting from the volup- 
tuous Medici strength sufficient of his own accord to 
reform the papacy in the spirit of the Gospel and of 
the ancient church; freely to descend from the in- 
toxicating theory of ecclesiastical supremacy to the 
humble evangelical scheme of one superintendent 
leading bishop presiding at the Christian councils, 
subject to the newly-awakened public spirit but lately 
brought to maturity, and also to the increasing know- 
ledge of the community, now boldly struggling 
upwards. And even if the pope had been capable of so 
great a resolution, it is yet a question which we are 
scarcely able to answer, whether the corruption in 
the condition of the Romish church, which had pro- 
ceeded so far, could have borne such an attempt to 
cure it ; or whether the deep incision which Luther 
had made was not unavoidable and indispensable. 

This only is certain, that the above attempt at re- 
conciliation made by Miltitz and Luther had not the 
slightest practical consequences ; for the papal bull, 



216 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

dated June 4, 1520. which pronounced Luther's ex- 
communication if he did not recant within sixty 
days, was in the meantime actively circulated by Dr. 
Eck, who had brought it with him from Rome. 
Luther felt that he ought not to be silent : at first he 
directed his arms against the vaunting servant, then 
against the misguided master alone ; first against Eck, 
next against the pope. In the pamphlet against Eck 
(On Eck's new Bulls and Lies, end of October), he, 
however, pretended not to believe in the validity of 
the bull, assuming it to be a fabrication of Dr. Eck's; 
because the negotiations with Miltitz had not yet been 
broken off, and the pope would not have confided the 
publication of the bull of excommunication to his 
(Luther's) most furious enemy. " I also hear it said 
that Dr. Eck hath brought with him from Rome a bull 
against me, said to be so like him, that it might be 
called Dr. Eck, it is so full of lies and errors ; and 
that he pretends it is the pope's work, although it is 
his own lying trick." He nevertheless renews his 
appeal to a general council ; the composition of which 
he presumes to be in conformity with the doctrine of 
the common priesthood of Christians, not hierarchical, 
but a free Christian assembly, in which the so-called 
laity was to be represented. " And I do not strive 
unreasonably for a free council, in which not only the 
least learned bishops and the coarsest and maddest 
sophists, as at Costnitz, but also wise experienced 



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princes, nobles, and others of the laity should have a 
seat ; for now even our matrons understand more of 
the Bible and of other Christian matters than Dr. 
Eck and his fellow-sophists." 

A month later (Nov. 1520) he directly attacked 
the bull, the genuineness of which could no longer be 
questioned, in the pamphlet, " Against the Bull of 
Antichrist." Now only, when the pope had openly 
broken with him, did he feel himself free from all 
restraint and consideration ; now only did he receive 
a decided proof of the anti-Christian falling away of 
the papacy, in the fact that the bull sentenced to be 
burnt all his writings without exception ; while he 
was more certain of this than of his life, that, with 
all their human imperfections and excrescences, they 
contained the pure apostolical doctrine. "If I knew 
that the pope at Rome had issued this bull, and that 
it was not invented by that arch-liar and knave, Dr. 
Eck, I would call on all Christians to regard the pope 
as nothing better than Antichrist. And if he do not 
cease his scandalous and public prohibition of our 
holding the true faith, the temporal sword ought to 
resist him with exultation, more readily than any in- 
fidel (Turken). 

" Let every one aid who deems himself a Christian ; 
let him stand by his faith, and by all poor simple 
souls who are tempted by such great soul-murderers 
and wolves unto death and damnation If the 



218 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



pope do not condemn and recall this bull, then no one 
will doubt that the pope is GooVs enemy, Christ's perse- 
cutor, the desolator of Christendom, and the real Anti- 
christ ; for I have never yet heard that any one hath 
condemned the Christian faith as this hellish and 
accursed bull doth." 

There occur expressions of wrath in this pamphlet 
which might be interpreted as an open summons to 
the destruction of the Eomish church by violent 
means : " What wonder, if princes, nobles, and others 
were to hit on the head the pope, bishops, monks, and 
priests, and drive them out of the country ! . . . . 
I hope it is now clear that it is not Dr. Luther, but 
the pope himself, with bishops, priests, and monks, 
who strive, b}^ means of this slanderous and infamous 
bull, for their own destruction, and bring the laity 
upon them." Similar expressions of the most violent 
irritation, not shrinking from extremities, are met 
with throughout this excited period of world-wide 
schism: "If we punish thieves with the rope, mur- 
derers with the sword, and heretics with fire, why do 
we not also attack with all and any weapons these 
baneful teachers of corruption, the popes, cardinals, 
bishops, and the whole swarm of the Eomish Sodom, 
who unceasingly seek to poison the church of God, 
and corrupt it to the very root ; and wash our hands 
in their blood, that we may save ourselves and our 
descendants from eternal fire ? . . . . They object to 



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me, that there is danger of stirring up a rebellion 
against the bishops and spiritual princes : but how if 
the Word of God be neglected, and the whole people 
of God be destroyed ? Is it right and just that all 
these souls should perish and die eternally, to keep 
up the empty temporal pomp of these vain shows? 
. . . . But if they will not hear the Word of God, 
but rage and rant, what can more justly befall them 
than extermination through rebellion ? And we 
should but laugh at it, even if it were to happen, as 
divine wisdom saith (Prov. i. 26). All those who 
lend their help, and make use of their lives, property, 
and reputation, in overturning the bishoprics and the 
government of the bishops, are beloved children of 
God, and true Christians, that keep God's command- 
ments, and fight against the tactics of the devil." 

Who will deny the impetuous and intolerant spirit 
which speaks in these words ; that spirit which the 
Saviour of the world rebuked solemnly on one 
occasion with these words : " Put up thy sword into 
the sheath ?" But who will dare condemn the man, 
carried away by the whirlwind of this extraordinary 
strife, for rash and violent speech ? From a secure 
haven we judge him who, in the midst of life and 
death, fought upon the high seas ; who believed what 
he held most sacred to be persecuted and threatened 
by Pharisee and Sadducee, by hypocrites on whom he 
would in angry moments have called down, with 



220 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



the zeal of Elias, the just punishment of Heaven. 
Let us, therefore, neither palliate nor condemn, but 
acknowledge the often-disguised or denied fact, that 
such moments and such temptations occurred in 
Luther's life. 

Things had now reached their climax : the pope 
condemned the German doctor as a heretic, demanded 
that he should be given up to Eome, and threatened 
every one with the interdict who protected or har- 
boured him. The doctor, on the other side, declared 
the pope to be Antichrist, and encouraged the powers 
of the state and the people to drive the Eomish 
faction from Germany, and if possible to make an end 
of papacy. "Oh, would to God," he writes to 
Spalatin, "that the Emperor Charles might prove 
himself a man, and, for Christ's sake, attack these 
devils !" 

To give to this rupture w T ith Eome a symbolical 
expression, and to meet the burning of his own 
writings by a similar measure, Luther proceeded (Dec. 
10, 1520) to the public burning of the bull and the 
papal canon. 

In a separate tract ("Why the Books of the Pope 
and his Disciples have been burnt by Doctor Luther") 
he justifies this proceeding in a tone of most courageous 
confidence, conscious of the impossibility of retreat : 
" I, Martin Luther, styled doctor of the holy Scrip- 
tures, an Augustin monk of Wittenberg, hereby make 



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known to all men, that the writings of the pope and 
of some of his disciples have been burnt by my 
advice, will, and assistance." 

To pacify and encourage some timid minds, who 
had been forbidden by their confessors to read Luther's 
works, he wrote at that time the " Instructions to 
those about to confess;" in which, opposed to ecclesias- 
tical ordinances, he maintains the most daring deduc- 
tions from spiritual Christianity: a If man do not 
absolve, then God will absolve; therefore, if thy con- 
fessor do not choose to absolve thee, be nevertheless 
cheerful and confident of absolution. But if the 
priest refuse the sacrament, thou must again humbly 
pray for it; for we must ever act with humility 
towards the devil and his works, yet keep a defiant 
faith. And if that be of no use, then give up the sacrar- 
ment, altar, priest, church : for the Word of God is 
higher than all things, the soul cannot do without it; but 
it may do without tlie sacrament ; then will the true 
Bishop himself feed thee spiritually with that same 
sacrament. . . . Therefore, beware of letting any thing 
upon earth, or if it were possibe, angels from heaven, 
have so much power as to force thee against thy con- 
science away from the doctrine which thou recognisest 
and esteemest as divine." Here again we have an 
expression of incalculable importance, in which the 
spiritual and individual religion of the heart and the 
external priest-religion of forms and ordinances are 
placed in direct opposition. 



222 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

It was as yet doubtful what part the emperor and 
the empire, the highest dignitaries of the German 
nation, would take on the occasion of Luther's 
rupture with Rome ; whether they would act with or 
against Home ; whether they would content themselves 
with executing the sentence of the pope, or examine 
the matter for themselves. The emperor was in- 
duced by Luther's protector, the Elector Frederick 
the Wise, to adopt the latter proceeding; and when, 
influenced by papal negotiations, he attempted, con- 
trary to the opinion of the Diet at Worms, to condemn 
the accused unheard, he was not allowed to do so, but 
w T as compelled (March 6, 1521) to give his consent to 
the citation of the German monk before the diet, for 
the purpose of defending his writings. 

When Luther first heard of the possibility of a 
citation to Worms, he wrote to Spalatin (December 
21, 1520) : "If I should be called upon, I will be 
carried there sick, if I may not go in health ; for it 
cannot be doubted that I am called by God, if the 
emperor summon me. If they mean to act with 
violence in this matter, I will commend it to God; 
He liveth and reigneth still who preserved the three 
men in the fiery furnace. But if He will not sustain 
me, my head is but a poor thing as compared with 
Christ, who was put to death with the greatest 
ignominy. For in this we must not weigh the weal 
or woe of any one, but rather take heed not to desert 



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the Gospel which we have received, nor suffer it to 
become a scoff and scorn to the godless, nor be afraid 

of shedding our blood for it Yet would I rather 

perish alone by the hands of the Romanists than have 

the emperor involved in this affair But if it is 

to be so, that I am to be delivered over, not only to 
the high priest, but to the Gentiles also, then God's 
will be done. Expect of me every thing but that 1 
shall fly or recant ; for I can do neither without danger 
to the cause of religion and to the salvation of 
many." 

To his elector he declared (January 25, 1521) : 
" I am prepared, in humble obedience, as soon as a 
safe-conduct be granted me, to appear on the coming 
sitting of the diet, before judges as learned as they 
are pious and above suspicion ; and with the help of 
the Almighty, so to defend myself that all shall 
learn I have acted hitherto without any thoughtless, 
arbitrary, or malicious motives, but according to my 
conscience, oath, and duty, as a poor teacher of the 
Scriptures, to the glory of God, for the advantage of the 
•whole German people, for the extirpation of dangerous 
abuses and superstitions, and for the liberation of Chris- 
tendom from this most unchristian and tyrannical degra- 
dation and blasphemy." We perceive that when 
about to appear before the highest tribunal of his 
country, he was fully conscious that the motives which 
had guided him for years were : to satisfy his conscience 



224 



MARTIN 



LUTHER, AND THE 



in accordance with the Scriptures, to liberate Chris- 
tianity from an unworthy spiritual bondage, and to 
promote the welfare of his country. * 

At length (March 26) the imperial herald, Caspar 
Sturm, appeared to escort him ; in the beginning of 
April he commenced his journey to Worms, where he 
arrived on the 16th of the same month. On passing 
through Naumburg, the portrait of a hero spiritually 
allied to him, — the Dominican Savonarola, the Italian 
who had borne witness with his blood against the 
degraded papacy, — was presented to him as an en- 
couragement upon his thorny path. All warnings 
against, and intimations of, the danger he was going 
to meet, he repelled with unshaken firmness : " And 
if they were to make a fire as high as heaven from 
Wittenberg to Worms, yet will I appear in the name 
of the Lord, place my foot upon the mouth of Behe- 
moth, profess Christ, and trust in him." "Christ 
liveth," he writes to Spalatin, April 14th ; " and we 
shall get to Worms in despite of all the gates of hell 
and the princes of the air !" 

At his first examination (April 17th) he demanded 
and obtained one day for consideration ; though only 
one hour after this he wrote to Cuspinian, " I shall 
not recant, so Christ be gracious unto me." Was the 
asking this delay a mere form ; or did the importance 
of the day and the assembly weigh so heavily upon 
his soul, that he wanted time once more to examine 



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himself and his cause before he gave his decisive 
answer? The hour so weighty in its consequence 
arrived on the evening of Thursday, April 18, 
1521. He was to answer the twofold question : 
Whether he recognised as his own the writings that 
had appeared under his name, and whether he would 
recant them ? The first he answered with £ yes,' the 
other with ■ no,' giving his reasons in detail. He met 
the request " that he would give a short answer with- 
out any arguments," with the celebrated words, in 
which he concentrates his entire history and position, 
his whole mind and its imperishable significance : 

" Unless I be vanquished by evidence from the holy 
Scriptures, or by clear and distinct arguments, I am so 
bound up and imprisoned in my conscience and the 
Word of God, that I can and may not recant; because 
it is neither safe nor well-advised to act in any way 
against conscience. Here I stand ; I cannot do otherwise. 
God help me /" 

We scarcely overrate the importance of that great 
day when we assert, that then only came into being true 
German Protestantism, the immeasurable consequences 
of which were to shake and reform the world. It 
was the solemn appearance of a new moral power in 
the world's history, rooted in the depth of religious 
conviction, and closely connected with irresistible 
political and intellectual instincts and wants; The 
religious dignity of spiritual individuality, the sane- 
15 



226 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

tity of conscience, the inviolability of its convictions, 
celebrated in that great hour their decisive victory. 
Solemnly before all the world was the doctrine then 
made known, that no human power or authority ought 
to affect the true inheritance of the soul ; that every 
higher conviction, every conception and appropriation 
of divine matters and of eternal truth, could only 
spring from the sacred soil of liberty, from the depth 
of moral individuality ; — a doctrine which, it is true, 
involved a very sea of dangers, but to which we 
assuredly owe the highest and most sublime degree 
of development of which mankind is susceptible in 
its earthly phases. "In worldly matters we are 
bound to believe and confide in each other," Luther 
wrote to the Emperor Charles, April 28th ; " but if 
the matter concern the Word of God and our eternal 
welfare, God doth not suffer us to be exposed to the 
danger of allowing one man to impose his own view 
upon another, or to decide for him. For He willeth 
that all men should be subject unto Him; He having 
alone the glory and honour of being truthful, nay, 
truth itself. .... This faith, submission, and humility, 
is indeed the true worship and adoration, which 
should be given to no creature." 

Those weighty words spoken at Worms were based 
upon the principle, that in the last appeal there are 
but two sources of religious conviction, of divine 
truth, " the evidence of the holy Scriptures, and clear 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



227 



distinct grounds ;" in other words, divine revelation in 
the Scriptures and in the human understanding ; the 
convincing power of the divine spirit which breathes 
in the pages of the oldest and purest Christian docu- 
ments, which still speaks daily to our hearts and 
understandings as irresistible comprehension and ex- 
perience. Spoken, as it was, with perfect simplicity, 
without any striving after systems, yet did this propo- 
sition contain the germ of spiritual struggles and 
consequent developments to be achieved by centuries, 
and powerfully influencing every thinking mind even 
to the present time. The two points on that occasion, 
still peaceably placed side by side, — the evidence of 
the Scriptures and of the understanding, — diverged 
afterwards into separate paths, and form, in their 
struggles and attempts at reconciliation, the principal 
facts in the history of Protestantism. Protestant 
faith in the Bible, and Protestant individual belief, 
the twin-children of the Reformation, separated and 
fought against each other like contending brothers, 
who cannot, after all, deny their common origin ; only 
that in the one case the authority of revelation in 
Scripture asserted pre-eminence; in the other, the 
power of individual judgment, of daily internal and 
external experience. But on some future day the two 
grand divisions of Protestantism shall unite again in 
a higher bond than on that day at Worms. 

After the public audience on the 18th of April, 



228 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



Luther attempted several private negotiations, which 
led, however, to no result. He left Worms (April 
26th, in the certainty that the emperor also would 
condemn him ; as indeed happened in the following 
month. The imperial edict issued against him 
(dated May 8th, although only published on the 26th) 
declared him a confirmed schismatic and open heretic, 
and demanded his being given up to the emperor; 
whoever should protect or harbour him was threatened 
with imperial proscription. 

The noble sympathy and foresight of the Elector 
of Saxony saved Luther from the storm which was 
gathering around him; it is well known that he 
caused him to be secretly carried to a secure asylum 
at the Wartburg (May 4, 1521). "If it were in my 
power," so wrote that gentle and faithful prince to his 
brother, " I would gladly help Martin to his right. 

But God will assuredly not forsake the righteous 

cause." 

Luther was made acquainted with the w^ell-meanf 
design of the elector, and agreed to it ; for he wrote (at 
Frankfort, on his return from Worms, April 28) to 
1 Lucas Kranach at Wittenberg : " I allow them to 
imprison and conceal me, I myself know not where ; 
and although I would rather have suffered death 
through the tyrants, particularly by the hands of the 
enraged Duke George of Saxony, yet must I not des- 
pise the advice of good people until the time come. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



229 



... I must be silent and suffer for a time. A little 
while, and the world seeth me no more ; again a little 
while, and ye shall see me, saith Christ. I hope it 
may be the same now. But the will of God, which 
is the wisest, be done in this matter on earth as it is 
in heaven." 

Many mourned over the reformer, who had so 
suddenly quitted the scene and vanished without 
leaving any traces behind, as over one secretly 
murdered or imprisoned. In the journal of Albrecht 
Diirer we find the affecting lamentations, of one of the 
staunchest of patriots : " God ! if Luther be dead, 
who will then interpret the holy Gospel to us so 
plainly ! Oh, how much more might he have done 
in the next ten or twenty years ! If they have 
murdered him, he hath suffered for Christian truth, 
and for having attacked the unchristian papacy, 
which strives against the liberty of Christ. We pray 
thee, heavenly Father, to grant thy Holy Spirit to 
another man like this one, who wrote more clearly 
than any other during the last 140 years, that he may 
reassemble thy holy Christian church from all parts ; so 
that we may once more lead a Christian life, and from 
our good works all unbelievers may be induced to join 
us and embrace the Christian faith." 

This is a voice from the heart of the people, which 
shows us with what hopes and expectations the more 
thinking portion of the nation had greeted Luther's 



230 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



appearance. The liberation, purification, and reunion 
of the Christian church were the desire of all the 
better-minded among the people; and they deemed 
the powerful monk of Wittenberg especially called to 
achieve this great end. 

In the mean time, he whom they thought dead was 
living and working mightily in his Patmos, notwith- 
standing the concealment and his disguise as " Master 
George." 

While struggling with bodily ailments and mental 
troubles, — he was dissatisfied, for instance, with his 
own conduct at Worms, and grieved that he should 
have suppressed his spirit instead of exhibiting the 
strength of Elias before those idols,— and in addition 
to numerous pamphlets and letters to friends, fighting 
his enemies and encouraging his friends, he began a 
labour which alone would have sufficed to make him 
immortal ; a labour, the consequences of which out- 
shine and outlive all others, — the translation of the 
Bible. In giving to his nation the original documents 
on which Christianity is founded in their own tongue, 
he gained over to his great cause in all time the 
millions, who will never again consent to be deprived 
of the right to study the spirit of Christianity at its 
original source. Through the translation of the Bible 
the Keformation became invincible. 

Luther's struggle against Rome, so prominent in the 
history of the world, may be reduced to distinct 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



231 



groupings in three words, u Wittenberg, Worms, 
Wartburg." From Wittenberg emanated the loud 
and ever-increasing protest against the degradation 
and enslaving of Christian truth, against the depravity 
of the visible church. At Worms the right to freedom 
of conscience was vindicated, and, we may say, 
solemnly admitted into the world by an act of courage 
arising from conviction. At the Wartburg, finally, 
the labour was begun which gave to the nation, at 
the same time, the most powerful weapon against 
spiritual slavery, and the most fruitful germ of 
religious progress and development. 

In this sense the words, Wittenberg, Worms, 
Wartburg, express the lasting and universal importance 
of Luther's work, and the true character of original 
German Protestantism. 



232 



MARTIN LUTHEEj AND THE 



THIRD SKETCH. 

REFORMATION AND REVOLUTION. 

Luther's residence at the Wartburg is the conclu- 
sion of the first great period of his labour, during 
which his mind first conceived the principle of the 
Reformation, and he alone advocated it against the 
papacy and the temporal powers. In his seclusion he 
had ample opportunity for looking back on the four 
extraordinary years of the grand struggle, and pre- 
paring himself for new enterprises. 

The principle of the Reformation had found in 
Luther the organ through which to impart its spirit ; 
but it was now to be ascertained whether he would 
stand the severe twofold test of resisting the internal 
enemies who, under the mask of religious and political 
consistency, sought to direct the movement, and to 
change reformation into revolution; and whether, 
after having avoided this danger, he would be able 
to carry through a comprehensive organisation, either 
as the foundation of a new church or the renovation 
of the old one. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



233 



RESISTANCE TO THE RELIGIOUS REVOLUTION. 

The reform movement on religious ground might 
have been driven onward to revolution, if the con- 
nexion between historical revelation, the historical 
character of Christ, and ecclesiastical tradition and 
government, had been utterly sundered. Luther 
perceived the danger of such a breaking-away from 
all historical Christianity in the more and more mani- 
fest attempts to undermine the authority of the Scrip- 
ture and of the sacrament. It appeared to him 
a departure from or a lowering of the meaning of 
Scripture, when enthusiasts (the people of Zwickau 
and the Anabaptists), relying upon their " inward 
call" {inneres Wort), their own individual inspiration, 
placed themselves above the Scriptures, and so sought 
to gain the victory for unconditional subjectivity, for 
individual free-will in all divine matters. In the 
same way he deemed it a perversion and degradation 
of the sacrament to denude it of its mystic and 
objective meaning, and to look upon it only as a 
symbol and token, as the enthusiastic Anabaptists 
and the sober matter-of-fact Karlstadt and Zw ingle 
did. In Luther's opinion, the continuance of a visible 
external church would by this means have been 
rendered impossible, the connexion with the divine 
Head of the church interrupted, future Christianity 



234 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



divided into small sects, and the masses. would have 
fallen back partly into heathenism, partly into 
popery. 

To prevent such lamentable results, he asserted 
with increasing energy the fundamental principle, 
that the true church is to be known by the Word and 
the sacrament, that divine revelation speaks to us 
most emphatically through the Scriptures. His 
straggle against the fanatics and sacramentalists 
(Schivarmgeister and Sacramentirer) — so he called his 
opponents in the ranks of the Protestants — does now, 
therefore, assume a prominent position by the side of 
his earlier warfare against Rome. 

It brought him back to Wittenberg, where, during 
his absence, these fanatical and revolutionary ideas 
had gained ground. They had been suppressed 
at Zwickau, but made a proselyte of Karlstadt, and 
even imposed upon Melanchthon. It was, indeed, an 
eruption of that volcanic fire, which, hidden in quiet 
times below the surface, breaks forth in decisive 
epochs and crises with often destructive force, as the 
beginning of a semi-spiritual semi-temporal revolution, 
having its origin in the popular imagination. The 
longing for an unattainable happiness, for some Utopia 
on earth, — that perpetual longing of the human 
heart, so easily fanned into flame in the breasts of the 
lower classes, the poor and wretched, — had found a 
bold expression, a decided sanction, in an enthusiastic 



R E F R MATION IN G E R M ANY. 



235 



brotherhood at Zwickau. Luther's proposed reforms 
were deemed here partial and insufficient. As the 
recipients of inward and direct divine revelations, they 
believed themselves to have a prophetic call for the 
social and religious reorganisation of the world, 
which, as the promised kingdom of God, was to 
begin by the destruction of the ungodly, and the 
gathering together of the saints or children of God. 
The whole existing order of church and state w T as to 
be destroyed to the very foundation, to make room 
for a state of perfect blessedness and purity (the 
millennium), to be introduced solely by these prophets 
themselves, who had been called by God to become 
his lawgivers and high-priests. This is the funda- 
mental idea upon which the fanatics at Zwickau 
attempted to build (1521) ; the same course w r as 
pursued (1525) at Miihlhausen, and (1534) at Minister. 
Similar seductive pictures of the imagination, painted 
with the glowing colours of enthusiasm and desire, 
were previously conceived by the secret sects of the 
middle ages. They have all the same origin, and 
appear at periods favourable to their nature, although 
under different names, even in our own times. 

At Zwickau several cloth-weavers, such as Nicholas 
Storch, and a young man educated at Wittenberg, 
Marcus Sttibner, took the lead in these movements; 
and the preacher Thomas Miinzer was doubtless, in a 
spiritual sense at least, in connexion with them; in 



236 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



knowledge he was superior to them all. They were 
banished from Zwickau (at the end of 1521), ere 
they had obtained sufficient influence to establish 
a " reign of terror," and went, some to Bohemia 
(Miinzer) : some to Wittenberg, as Stiibner, Storch, 
and others. 

Luther was made acquainted with these circum- 
stances while yet at the Wartburg, and hastened to 
admonish his friends at Wittenberg not to decide too 
quickly in this affair, but soberly to try " these 
spirits," whether the pretended prophets could give 
proofs of their divine call, and whether they had 
passed through the true " spiritual couflict, the second 
birth, death and hell :" if not, they could not have 
the sign of the Son of man, the touchstone which 
alone could prove the Christian, and were not to be 
believed. 

But when Karlstadt was led away by these fanatics 
to take part in their iconoclastic mischief, in the in- 
tentional, reckless, and coarse disregard of all forms ; 
when the community at Wittenberg was in danger of 
being dispersed through license and insubordination, — 
Luther could no longer remain in his retreat. He felt 
that the cause of the Reformation was threatened 
with greater danger from the blind fanatical proceed- 
ings of those who had hitherto been his adherents 
than from his open opponents ; he left his asylum, 
that he might meet the danger before it became 
irremediable. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 237 

Outlawed by the emperor, excommunicated by the 
pope, he departed from the Wartburg (May 3, 1522), 
to oppose a former friend, and resist a movement 
which boasted of his name and spirit. He went to 
Wittenberg contrary to the advice, nay the command 
of his prince ; of the only one who had hitherto pro- 
tected him, but had informed him that at Wittenberg 
he should not now be able to continue that protection. 
This was another of the great moments of Luther's 
life, in which he stands before us in the full strength 
of his faith, as the hero and leader of his time. On 
his journey from the Wartburg, he wrote at Bora a to 
the elector (March 5) the extraordinary letter, 
which may appear to some as a bold defiance, to 
others as the most heroic trust in God : " I would 
wish to condole with your serene highness, not on my 
account, but on account of the stupid business at 
Wittenberg, which has arisen among our people to the 
disgrace of the Gospel; for I myself have been so 
oppressed with grief that were I not sure that we hold 
the true Gospel, I should ere this have despaired of 
our cause. All that hath been inflicted upon me 
hitherto is as nothing, or only as a mere mockery, 
when compared with this. If it had been possible, I 
would willingly have given my life that it should not 
have happened ; for that hath been done which we 
cannot answer for either to God or to the world ; and 
yet it is laid to my charge, and worse still, to the 
charge of the holy Gospel. 



238 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

" As far as I am concerned, your grace, I answer 
thus : Your grace knows — or if you do not know, I 
now make it known unto you — that I have received 
the Gospel, not from men, but from heaven alone, 
through our Lord Jesus Christ; I would willingly 
have boasted — as I mean to do in future — and signed 
myself his servant and evangelist. I did not offer 
myself for examination and judgment because I was 
in doubt, but from becoming humility, and to give an 
example to others. But as I now see that my too- 
great humility tends to the discredit of the Gospel, 
and that the devil will take possession of the whole 
ground if I grant him a hand's breadth, I must, to 
satisfy my conscience, act differently. I have given 
way long enough to your grace in remaining quiet 
this year (from May 1521 to March 1522). For the 
devil knows very well that I have not done so from 
lack of courage ; he knew my heart when I arrived at 
Worms, that if I had known that as many devils 
w r aited for me as there are tiles upon the roofs, I 
should nevertheless have leapt among them with joy. 
. . . And since our Father, in his boundless mercy, 
hath given us, through the Gospel, the victory over 
all devils and death, and the full assurance that we 
may call him c our beloved Father,' your grace may 
judge yourself that it would be the highest offence 
against such a Father, not to confide in him sufficiently 
to make us superior to the anger of Duke George. I 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 239 

can say of myself, that if this matter stood at Leipzic 
as it stands at Wittenberg, I should nevertheless ride 
thither, even if it rained for nine days nothing but 
Duke Georges, and each one were nine times more 
enraged than this one is. He takes my Lord Jesus 
to be a man of straw ; this my Master and I may well 
beVtr for a time. ... I have prayed and wept for him 
more than once, that the Lord would enlighten him ; 
I will pray and weep once more, but for the last time. 
I could quickly throttle him with one word, if that 
would settle the matter. ... This has been written in 
the supposition that your grace knows I come to 
Wittenberg under a much higher protection than 
that of the elector. . . . Neither do I intend to demand 
protection from your grace. Indeed, I hold that I 
can protect your grace much better than you can pro- 
tect me. Besides, if I knew that your grace could 
and would protect me, I should not come. In this 
cause, the sword neither can nor ought to decide or 
help ; God only must decide in it, without any human 
care or help. Therefore he who hath most faith can 
protect most. Now as I perceive that your grace is 
still very weak in the faith, I cannot look upon your 
grace as the man that could protect or save me. 
God wills not either your grace's care and striving or 
mine. He wills it to be left to him. If your grace 
believeth, you will be safe and have peace ; if you do 
not believe, I do 5 and must leave your grace, in your 



240 MARTI N LUTHER, AND THE 

unbelief, to the torment and trouble to which those 
are exposed who have not faith. Before men your 
grace ought to take this course. Be obedient, as 
elector, to your superiors ; give way to his imperial 
majesty, occording to the laws of the empire ; and do 
not oppose or resist the temporal power, if it seek to 
capture or kill me : for no one is to oppose or resist 
the temporal power, if it seek to capture or kill me : 
for no one is to oppose or resist the powers that be, 
except He who has appointed them ; otherwise, it is 
rebellion and against God. ... If your grace believed, 
you would see the glory of God ; but as you do not 
believe, you have as yet seen nothing." 

This letter certainly stands alone of its kind in 
history. It unquestionably offers to an opponent 
many a handle for condemnation ; it contains passages 
(the threat, for instance, that he could kill Duke 
George with a word, and other similar phrases) which, 
on cool reflection, might be regarded as expressing 
temerity, and an exaggerated estimate of self. But 
only he who can place himself completely in Luther's 
position at that time, — who can thoroughly estimate 
the elevation of spirit, the sublime confidence which 
fills the soul that has, after long struggles and doubts, 
resolved to place itself and tlte cause it seeks to promote, 
unconditionally and prepared for all consequences, under 
the immediate sole protection of God, — only he has the 
right to point out the unbecoming and repulsive 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 341 

features which are exhibited here, and on many other 
occasions, by the side of the divinely great qualities 
of the hero's mind ; namely, a tendency to pride and 
temerity, rooted in his nature, and aggravated by the 
events of his life, combined with a want of modera- 
tion in the expression of his feelings, temper, and. 
passions. 

And how mild, attractive, and admirable he appears 
to us, soon after writing this letter, in the hostelry of 
the Black Bear at Jena, at the well-known meeting 
with the two Swiss students, who took him for Ulrich 
of Hutten ; or in the scene with the merchants, who, 
without knowing him, expressed the anxious wish to 
be allowed but once to confess to Luther, they having 
just then bought his last publication ! How impres- 
sively does that man speak to our hearts, who can 
converse with old and young, — have a jest for the 
one, edification for the other, — while standing on a 
volcano which may swallow him up at any moment ! 

What were the weapons with which he meant to 
oppose the storm that had broken out at Wittenberg ? 
Most decidedly the same doctrine to which he had 
borne witness at Worms against other opponents, — 
the assertion of Christian freedom of conscience. Not 
even in the name and under the pretence of freedom, 
was compulsion to be practised against the weaker 
parties, whose conscience could not yet bear such 
freedom. To the blind bigotry which rejected all 
16 



242 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

forms, lie opposed the divine command of love, as a 
barrier for the protection of the weaker or more 
peaceable brethren, who still clung to the traditional 
form. " Dear brethren," he cried, in the first of his 
eight Lenten sermons, by which he put a stop to the 
prevailing disorders, " the kingdom of God, which is 
in us, consists not in speeches or words, but in deeds, 
in works, and exercises. God will have no mere listeners 
or repeaters, but followers, labourers in the faith 
through love. For faith without love is not sufficient ; 
indeed it is not faith, but only the appearance of faith : 
as a face seen in a mirror is not a real face, but only a 
reflection. ." . . Therefore let us feed others with milk, 
as we have been fed, until they also become strong in 
the faith." In the second sermon on the Monday 
after Invocavit, he says ; " Summa summarum ! I will 
preach it, I will say it, I will write it ; but I will not 
force or urge any one with violence; for faith must 
come readily, iviihout constraint and without violence. 
Take example by me. I have been opposed to in- 
dulgences and to popery, but have not used violence. 
I have only practised, preached, and written the 
Word of God ; I have done nothing else. This, while 
I slept, while I drank Wittenberg beer with my 
Philip and Amsdorf, has done so much that popery 
has become greatly weakened, and no prince or 
emperor has done it so much damage. I have done 
nothing; the Word has done and accomplished all. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 243 

If I had chosen to act violently, I might have caused 
much bloodshed in Germany ; indeed, I might have 
begun a game at Worms that should have left the 
emperor without security. But what would it be? 
A fool's game, and a destruction of body and soul. . . 
. . How think ye the devil judges when people want 
to carry their point with violence ? He sits behind 
in hell, and thinks : Oh, what a fine game the fools 
are playing ! But he is vexed when we act according 
to the Word, and let that only influence us. That is 
almighty, that taketh the heart prisoner ; and when 
that is imprisoned, the devil's work must fall away of 
itself." " The kingdom of God," he says in his fifth 
Lenten sermon, " consists not in external things, 
which you may seize or feel, but in faith. . . . There- 
fore is nothing new to be introduced unless the Gospel 
be thoroughly preached and known" 

He therefore sets forth, as the fundamental condi- 
tions of the Reformation, the two demands, liberty and 
order. Entire liberty of conscience, which need be 
subject to no other power than the unconquerable 
inward power of truth (the Word) ; and maintenance 
of good order at every unavoidable innovation, to be 
insisted on by the lawful temporal authorities, but 
never by disorderly masses. 

Luther's powers of persuasion and his great in- 
fluence succeeded in speedily guiding the overflowing 
stream back to its channel. Those who could not be 



244 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



convinced, were yet (like Karlstadt) persuaded to 
keep quiet for a time, and be silent : others, the 
enthusiasts of Zwickau, had to leave the town. And 
quiet was restored for a time; but it was only the 
quiet which precedes a tempest. 



The desire for radical change, checked by Luther, 
was, however, soon reanimated, and found in Miinzer 
and Karlstadt the leaders, who laboured at first sepa- 
rately, but at length, by uniting their efforts, succeeded 
during the following years in opening a way for it. 
If Karlstadt was the first representative of the 
doctrinal rupture among the Protestants, which was 
promoted at a later period, with infinitely greater 
talent and true vocation, by Zwingle, (Ecolampadus, 
and those who thought with them, — Thomas Miinzer 
represented most decidedly the political rupture, which 
soon announced itself boldly in the midst of the 
Keformation. Luther collected all his strength foi 
the victory over both these opponents. Through thu 
str uggle and its consequences he became the founder of 
Lutheran-ism, as he had become the guide and founder 
of German Protestantism in the previous struggle. 

Karlstadt had, in the beginning of the year 1524, 
resumed at Orlamiinde the career interrupted at 
Wittenberg in 1522. He was completely governed by 
a fanatical and subjective spiritualism ; and being 



REFORMATION IN 



GERMANY. 



245 



banished the country by the elector, gave the signal 
for the unhappy disputations concerning the sacra- 
ment, by an attack upon Luther's mystical interpreta- 
tion of the same. Luther met him in person at 
Orlamlinde, but without success, and opposed him 
afterwards relentlessly in many polemical writings. 

In the letter addressed " To the Christians at 
Strasburg" (Dec. 15, 1524), he declares: "If our 
gospel be the true gospel, of which I have no doubt, 
it must be attacked, tried, and probed from both 
sides : on the one, by external worldly disgrace and 
the hatred of its enemies ; on the other, by our own 
separation and dissensions. Christ must not only 
have Caiaphas among his enemies, but also Judas 
among his friends. Therefore must we be neither 
astonished nor frightened if dissensions arise among 
us, but boldly reflect that it must and will be so ; and 
pray to God that he may be with us, and keep us in 

the right path For I have learnt that Dr. 

Karlstadt hath raised a great disturbance among you 
with his fanaticism and sacrament, his images and 
baptism, as he has done elsewhere also." 

The manner in which Luther takes up and judges 
the position of his opponents is remarkable : " His 
case appears to me to be this : lie falls with as great 
violence upon external things, as if the whole power of a 
Christian being depended upon the destruction of images, 
casting aside the sacraments, and preventing baptism ; 



246 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

as if he meant by this smoke and vapour to darken 
the sun, the light of the gospel, and the principal 
articles of Christian faith, so that the world might 
no longer see, and forget all that hath been hitherto 
taught by us ! . . . . This is therefore a clumsy devil, 
that I care little for. Now it is my best advice and 
warning, that you should confine yourselves to the 
single question : What constitutes a Christian ? If 
any one make a proposition, begin and say : Dear 
friend, does this make a Christian? if not, then do 
not regard it as important, nor dwell upon it seriously. 
But if an individual be too weak for this, then let him 
wait and see what we or others say to it. I have 
managed very well hitherto, God be thanked, with 
essentials ; I hope I may not now fail with regard to 
externals." 

These words, as well as the whole course of the 
dissension, show unmistakably that the difference 
was as much personal as controversial. Luther hated 
and abhorred the stormy and violent passions, the im- 
moderate estimation of the value of external points, 
and the want of true liberality and humanity, which 
accompanied this feverish and intrinsically meaning- 
less revolutionary movement. A dissension of this 
kind will take place at all times and every where, 
when true liberality and deep religious feeling connect 
themselves with heartless and spiritually crude 
radicalism, in opposition to a common enemy. The 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



247 



casual and temporary connexion is unavoidably and 
speedily changed for keen opposition ; the more keen 
and intense, the nearer the opinions of the parties 
previously stood to each other, as was the case between 
Luther and Karlstadt. The former was principally 
influenced in his opposition to the latter by the great 
doctrinal points at issue; but the idea that the direc- 
tion of the great reform movement, which had 
hitherto been confided to him alone, should now pass 
into other hands, and these so clumsy and unskilled, 
no doubt greatly increased the bitterness of his 
feelings. 

In the letter (to the Christians at Strasburg) a 
passage occurs, the full meaning of which has been 
rarely estimated at its real importance — a passage 
which gives us an insight into the very depth of his 
character and his train of thought : " This much I 
confess : if Dr. Karlstadt or any one else could have 
convinced me five years ago that there was nothing 
but bread and wine in the sacrament, he would have 
rendered me a great service. I have undergone great 
temptations, and struggled and striven to get free of 
this, because I saiv clearly that with this I could have 
given the severest Note to popery. But I am bound ; 1 
cannot get free of it ; the text is too strong, and cannot be 
wrested from its sense by words. Indeed, if it could 
happen even now that any one could prove to me on 
firm grounds that simple bread and wine was present, 



248 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

they would not need to attack me with so much fury : 
I am, alas, hut too much inclined to it, as far as I know 
my sinful nature (meinen Adam). But the way in 
which Dr. Karlstadt raves about it affects me so 
little, that my opinion becomes only stronger through it. 
And if I had not believed it before, such lame, loose 
fooleries, without any evidence, grounded only on 
human sense and conceit, would at once make me 
believe that his opinion must be naught." It is 
evident that Luther, in the interest of his struggle 
against Rome, had been strongly inclined to accept 
the symbolical meaning of the word used in the in- 
stitution of the Lord's supper; and even at the period 
above alluded to, his understanding (his old Adam) 
would have decided for this interpretation : but then, 
as before, the impressiveness of the scriptural words 
restrained him ; they seemed to him not to admit of 
any other than a literal sense ; a symbolical interpre- 
tation appeared as an offence against the conscientious 
exposition of Scripture : " the text was too powerful 
for him." And yet from this controversy, whether a 
figurative acceptation of those words were admissible 
to the Christian or not, arose the schism in the pro- 
fession of faith which for centuries violently separated 
Protestantism into two distinct camps. 

On this occasion Luther expressed strong doubts, 
also, of the political opinions of Karlstadt; although 
the latter had declared, in direct opposition to 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



249 



Utilizer's proceedings, " we will not have recourse to 
blows and spears." " Karlstadt had nearly persuaded 
me at Jena," writes Luther, "that I ought not to 
confound his spirit with that of the rebellious 
murderous people of Allstedt* (Munzer's party). 
But when I came to Orlamtinde among his Christians, 
I soon saw what kind of seed he had sown ; and I 
might be thankful that I was not driven out with 
stones and dirt. As it was, many gave me these and 
similar benedictions : ' Go, in the name of a thou- 
sand !' ' May you break your neck before you 

get out of the town !' " 

At the conclusion of the letter he once more rises 
grandly above all the personalities which had been 
mixed up with the struggle : " Let every one look 
only for the straight path ; what law, gospel, faith, the 
kingdom of Christ, Christian freedom, love, patience, 
human law, &c. are; that is enough for us to learn for 
all time. I beg of your Gospellers to direct you away 
from Luther or Karlstadt, but ever towards Christ : 
not as Karlstadt does, solely pointing out the works 
of Christ as an example (which is the least portion 
of Christ, and in which he resembles other saints) ; 
but how he is a gift of God, or, as St. Paul says, He 
is made unto us of God the power, wisdom, righteous- 
ness, redemption, and sane tificat ion of God ivhich 
meaning these prophets have never felt, tasted, or learned ; 



* A small town in Thuringia, where Mimzer lived as preacher. 



250 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

and cackle, therefore, with their living voice from 
heaven, many bombastic words (schwulstige Wo?*te) 
which they themselves never understood, and by 
which they only confound tender consciences." 

That which he had hastily and briefly stated in his 
" Letter to the Christians at Strasburg," he further 
explains in the " Treatise against the Heavenly 
Prophets" (Jan. 1525), so impressively, that this was 
plainly intended to be the decisive and annihilating 
blow against the whole movement : " Dr. Andreas 
Karlstadt," it is said in the beginning of this pamphlet, 
"has separated himself from us, and has become our 
worst foe. Christ did not mean to inspire terror, but 
give us his mind and courage, that we may not err 
and tremble before this Satan, who pretends that he 
will justify the sacrament, hut who has very different 
intentions, namely, to corrupt the whole doctrine of the 

Qospelhy the cunning handling of the Scriptures 

These ambitious prophets do nothing but destroy 
images, break down churches, do away with the 
sacraments, and seek for a peculiar chosen mortifica- 
tion of the flesh. Neither have they hitherto acted 
according to the doctrine of faith, nor taught hoiu to 
encourage conscience, which is nevertheless the first and 
most important part of the Christian doctrine. And if 
they had achieved all ; if no image existed, no church 
were standing, no one believed any longer that the 
flesh and blood of Christ are in the sacrament; and 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 251 

if all went about in the grey coats of the peasant 
(such as Karlstadt wore for some time, to do away 
with all distinction of rank), — what would be gained 
by it ? Would they have become Christians by it ? 
Where would faith and love be ? were they to come 

only afterwards ? Fame and honour, and a 

fresh monastic glory, might be gained by it; but con- 
science ivia not be the better for it ; nor do such false 
spirits care for this. . . . Therefore must we have some- 
thing higher to liberate and to comfort conscience ; and 
this is the Holy Ghost, which cannot be obtained by 
the destruction of images or any other work, but 
solely through faith and the Gospel." 

Luther's boldest and most authoritative assertion 
against the position Karlstadt and those connected 
with him had taken up, was contained in the cutting 
words, that their opinions were essentially a falling 
back from Christianity to Judaism, from the Gospel to 
the boohs of Moses : (i Well then, we will come to the 
true point, and say that these prophets of Moses are 
to leave us unconnected with Moses ; we will neither 
hear nor see Moses. How like ye this, my dear 
banded spirits (Rottengeister) ? We say further, that 
all such Mosaic teachers deny the Gospel, banish 
Christ, and abolish the whole New Testament. I 
speak now as a Christian and for Christians. For 
Moses has been given to the Jewish people only, and 
does not concern us heathens and Christians ; we have 



252 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

our Gospel and the New Testament. Thanks are 
due to the pious Paul, with Isaiah, for having so long 
before saved us from these confederate spirits; else 
we might sit on the Sabbath-day and lean our head 
on our hand, and wail for the voice from heaven, as 
they pretend to do. Indeed, if Karlstadt were to 
write further about the Sabbath, Sunday would have 
to give way, and the Sabbath — that is to say, 
Saturday — must be kept holy ; he would truly make 
us Jews in all things, and we should come to be cir- 
cumcised: for that is true, and cannot be denied, that 
he who deems it necessary to keep one law of Moses, 
and keeps it as the law of Moses, must deem all 
necessary, and keep them all. It is not only the law 
of Moses that says, e thou shalt do no murder, thou 
shalt not steal,' &c, hut the natural law that is written 

in every ones heart, as Paul teacheth Else, if it 

were not written in every one's heart, the law would 
have to be taught and preached long enough ere con- 
science adopted it. Now if the law of Moses and the 
law of nature be one, that law will remain, and can- 
not be abolished externally, except through faith 
spiritually; therefore is image-worship, the observance 
of the Sabbath, and all that Moses hath added to the 
law of nature, not binding upon us. Therefore let 
Moses be 'the Saxon mirror'* for the Jews, and not 

* Sachsen spiegel : a collection of laws made during the middle 
ages, and established in the greatest part of northern and central 



REFORMATION" II GERMANY. 253 

perplex us heathens (i, e. heathen Christians) with it. 
Why do we teach and keep the ten commandments ? 
Because the laws of nature are no where so subtly and 
compactly instituted as in Moses. And I could wish to 
take some other temporal matters from Moses ; such 
as, the law of separation (of married persons), the 
year of jubilee, the year of release, tithes, and other 
things ; by which laws the world would be better 
ruled than now with the law of interest, of buying 
and selling, and giving in marriage : — in the same 
manner as one land takes example by the laws of 
another, as the Komans took the twelve tables from 

the Greeks Neither is it necessary to keep 

the Sabbath or Sunday on account of the law of 
Moses, but because nature teaches that a day of rest 
is necessary to refresh man and beast, which natural 
reason Moses gives for his Sabbath. If it is to be 
kept for rest only, it is clear that he who needs not 
rest may break the Sabbath, and rest another day 
instead, as nature dictates. The Sabbath is also to 
be kept for preaching and hearing the word of 
God." 

The above extract deserves to be quoted in extenso, 
because it is not only important as repudiating the 
indistinct and over-strained Jewish ideas of Luther's 

Germany; incorporated with others were portions of the Roman and 
canonical law. This collection of laws is highly esteemed in our 
day, and a new edition of it appeared in Berlin as late as 1835. 
The present laws of Saxony are founded upon it. 



254 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

opponents, but because it gives at the same time a 
striking proof of the freedom from prejudice, and of 
the elevation of Christian views which he attains 
wherever overpowering prejudice or the bitterness of 
debate do not blind him. 

In this pamphlet also he attributes great importance 
to the social and political dangers arising from Karl- 
stad t's opinions, whose violent proceedings he calls 
upon the magistrates to check : " I intend, so God 
will, to flatter no prince ; but still less will I suffer 
that the banding together and disobedience of the 
people should bring about contempt of constituted 
authorities. And it is my humble admonition and 
prayer to all princes, sovereigns, and authorities, 
seriously to insist that those preachers who do not 
teach quietly, but seduce the people and destroy 
images and churches behind the backs of the authori- 
ties, should at once be banished the country r , and be 
dealt with in such a manner as to compel them to desist. 
I do not by this means want to impede the preaching 
of the Word of God, but put a stop to the mischievous 
doings of the impious enthusiasts and riotous bands, 
which it behoves the magistrate to. do. . . If the 
masses are to have the right and the power to execute 
one law of God in this way, it will be necessary to 
permit them afterwards to execute all the laws ; they 
must, in that case (instead of the proper authorities), 
kill the murderers, punish the adulterers and thieves, 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



255 



— whoever can manage it first. After that it will go 
further, and they will have to kill all ungodly persons ; 

for so Moses commands (Deut. vii.) Those bands 

of murderers, because they apply the law of Moses to 
the people (rabble), are impelled to rebellion, to 
murder, and to kill, as to a work which God hath 
commanded. Take the town-spirit (Thomas Mtinzer) 
as an example When he had got so far in- 
timate with the devil (den Teufel zu Qevattern gebeten 
Jiatte) that the rabble could destroy the images without 
proper authority, he was compelled also to go further, 
and order the people to commit murder. . . Dear sirs, 
the devil careth not for the destruction of images; 
but he wants to use it as an opening, that he may 
shed blood and commit murder in the world. 

" I ask no longer what Dr. Karlstadt says or does, 
— I speak of the spirit which impels his followers : it 
is not a good one, and means murder and rebellion, 
however he may bow and scrape For if Karl- 
stadt were to bring a great mob about him, as he in- 
tended when he thought of arming on the Saale, and 
the Scriptures are read in German, what would he do 
if Master Omnes (the mob) were to place the command 
6 to kill the wicked' before him? how would he guard 
against that ? If he had never intended to agree to 
this, he would yet have to consent, for they would 
resist him and cry : Here stands the Word of God : 
we must carry it out ! It is not well to play with 



/ • •• 

256 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

Master Omnes ; therefore hath God instituted authority, 
that the world may he well ordered. . . . Karlstadt 
drags the £ heavenly prophets' about with him, which 
have originated the Allstedt (Miinzer's) spirit : of 
these he learns ; with these he abides. They sneak 
about the country, and creep together along the 
banks of the Saale, where they intend to make their 

nest They cast their poison about in secret, 

and infuse it into Dr. Ka.rlstadt, that he may spread 

it abroad with tongue and pen These prophets 

teach that they are to reform Christianity, and 
establish a new one in the following manner : they 
are to strangle all princes and all the wicked, that 
they may become masters, and live among none but 
saints upon earth. This I and many others have 
heard from themselves. Karlstadt knows this also, 
and yet shuns them not ; and I am to believe that he 
doth not seek murder and rebellion ? .... As they 
are bent upon strangling and murder, they can only 
proceed from the devil himself, even though they 
knew all wisdom and the Scriptures. Is it not vexa- 
tious that the people should have become here and 
there disquieted and proud, before the princes were 
aware of it ? And if they hear a preacher who bids 
them be peaceable and obedient to authority, they 
call him at once a calumniator and the hypocritical 
servant of princes, and point at him with their 
fingers. But if he say, Kill, kill ! give way to no one ; 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 257 

ye are the real people, &c, — they call him the true 
evangelical preacher." 

At the conclusion of this work he once more rests 
his warnings against Karlstadt and his prophet on the 
two counts : that they go about and teach without a 
call ; and that they avoid and fly from the principal 
point in the Christian doctrine, how ice may rid our- 
selves of our sins, have a quiet conscience, and acquire 
a peaceable cheerful heart in God, in which all true 
power lies. 

It is a proof of Luther's sound views and tact, that 
he recognised in the Karlstadt movement, in spite of 
the apparently peaceable theory of this unstable, 
ambitious, narrow-minded, and short-sighted man, the 
destructive revolutionary element, which threatened 
to evoke a rude democracy both in faith and morals, 
in doctrine and life. Nevertheless, the conflict with 
Karlstadt proved a serious injury to his cause, a pain- 
ful expenditure of mental energy which was lost for 
other more beneficial objects, which had the most 
important consequences on the organised development 
of Protestantism, and from which Germany has 
suffered and is still suffering. The same may be said, 
in a still higher degree, of the continuation of the 
controversy respecting the sacrament, which Karlstadt 
had originated, and which, on his being set aside, was 
resumed and carried on by the reformers of Switzer- 
land and of the south of Germany. 
17 



258 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



RESISTANCE TO THE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL REVOLUTION. 

The lever, however, had long been applied, which, 
by the help of the religious ideas represented by 
Luther, was to bring about a complete political and 
social revolution. We have already, at the beginning 
of this section, mentioned Thomas Miinzer, as the 
boldest and most notorious leader of this movement, 
who, with infinitely greater courage and fanaticism 
than Karlstadt, endeavoured to realise the idea of an 
entire overthrow of the existing order in church and 
state, and in society at large. 

While threatened by the storm impending from 
this quarter, Luther maintained the principle he had 
previously defended against Karlstadt : The Word 
must do all. It was his great design to overthrow the 
papacy, reform the church, and save Germany by 
conviction alone, by the still small voice of truth. 
He repudiated violence from the first, and most 
decidely when it assumed the appearance of revolt 
and recourse to arms. On this account he had already 
separated from Ulrich von Hutten, who strove to 
instigate his friend Sickingen to an unseasonable and 
immature rising, and to excite the people to insurrec- 
tion ; it was therefore to be expected that he should 
oppose much more decisively a man like Miinzer, who 
strove to kindle the fiercest flames of political and 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 259 

religious fanaticism. In the opposition to him, a 
struggle originated for the existence or non-existence 
of the Reformation, for civilisation or barbarism, for 
spiritual Christianity or pharisaical Judaism, for 
freedom or anarchy, for the gentle blessings of religion, 
or the sanguinary horrors of a fanatical terrorism. 

Before the inevitable results of this man's proceed- 
ings had become apparent, Luther had raised a 
warning voice in his "Letter to the Princes of 
Saxony against the Rebellious Spirit," 1524 {Brief an 
die Fiirsten von Saclisen vom aiifruJireriscIiem Geist), 
against the agitator, who was at that time actively 
propagating his opinions at Allstedt, in the electorate 
of Saxony. " Satan being driven out from among 
us, — having wandered a year, or it may be three, in 
the wilderness, — hath at last made a nest for himself 
at Allstedt, and thinks to take advantage of the peace 

and protection we enjoy to fight against us Now 

I rejoice in this, that our people do not begin similar 
practices ; and they (i. e. Miinzer and his followers) 
even boast that they do not belong to us, have learnt 
and received nothing from us, but are from heaven, 
and hear God himself speak to them as to the angels ; 
and it appears (to them) but a poor thing that we at 
Wittenberg preach faith, love, and the cross of Christ. 
They say : Thou must hear God's voice thyself, feel 
and suffer his work in thee. The Scripture is naught 
to them, the Bible indeed a mere Babel (ja BibeL 



260 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

Babel, Babel). ... I have written this letter solely 
because I heard that this spirit does not intend to stop 
at icords, but to use his fists, and resist the powers that 
be with violence. I thought it would come to this, 
that they intended to be lords of this world ; although 
Christ denied this before Pilate, and said that his 
kingdom was not of this world. It behoves me, 
therefore, humbly to implore and caution your graces 
to look seriously to this matter, as in duty bound ; to 
guard against this mischief by your lawful authority, 
and check this outbreak in the bud. For your graces 
are well aware that power and temporal dominion 
have been given and intrusted to you by God for the 
purpose of maintaining peace and punishing evil- 
doers God will require you to answer for any 

negligence in using the sword he hath committed to 

you If he would creep out of his hole and not 

shun the light, but stand boldly before his enemies 
and opponents, avow himself and make answer, we 
should then have some fruit wherewith to test this 
spirit. But this spirit at Allstedt avoids such a 
course, as the devil dreads the cross. . . . But what is 
this bold defiant spirit, that keeps himself so close, 
and will only stand before those lie does not fear ? 
What kind of spirit is this, who is afraid of two or 
three, and dare not show himself to those he doth fear ? 
He smells a rat (er riecht den Braten). He hath had 
a rap once or twice in my presence, in my monastery 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



261 



at Wittenberg; therefore he slinks away, and will 
appear only before his own people, who say 'yes' to 
all his fine speeches I cannot boast of or pre- 
sume upon such fine speeches ; I am a poor miserable 
man, and have not managed my matters so cleverly, 
but have set about them with fear and trembling. . 
How humbly did I first assail the pope ! how I wept 
and strove ! . . . Nevertheless, I have in my humble 
spirit done that which this devouring lion hath not 

yet attempted I have stood at Leipsic before 

the most formidable assembly ; at Augsburg, before 
my fiercest foes ; at Worms, before the emperor and 
all the empire. I have been obliged to contend in 
corners with one, two, or three ; with whomsoever, where 
and howsoever they pleased; — my poor timid spirit 
stood exposed like a flower of the field. 

"If necessary, I can make known what took place 
between me and this spirit in my own cell, that all 
the world may be able to judge that he is assuredly a 
lying devil. If they wish to show what spirit they 
are of, let them do it as it is fit, and let themselves be 
tried first, either by us or by the papists. For they 
esteem us — I thank God for it! — worse foes than the 

papists, although they profit by our viotory, 

for which they have not striven nor risked their blood ; 
but I have gained it at the peril of my life, nor have 

I hitherto flinched But I know that we who 

have the Gospel — poor sinners as we are — possess the 



262 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

true spirit; all the first-fruits of the spirit, although we 
have not yet the fulness thereof. We know, indeed, 
what faith, love, and the cross is; and there is no 
higher knowledge on earth than faith and love. By 
this we can know and judge which doctrine is true or 
false, conformable to the faith or not. So can we 
know and judge this lying spirit; because he intends 
to do away with the Scripture and the spoken word 
of God, and abolish the sacraments of baptism and the 
Lord's supper ; and would lead us to try God by our 
own will and works, and appoint time, place, and 
limit for his work in us. 

i: To sum up all, let not your graces interfere with 
freedom of speech ; do not fear to let them preach to tlieir 
heart's content, how and against whom they please. 
Sects there must be; and God's Word must take the 
field and conquer. If this is a true spirit, it will not 
fear us, and will keep its ground ; but if ours is the 
true spirit, it will not fear them : let the spirits confront 
each other and contend. If in the meantime a few be 
seduced, well and good; it is the course of war; on 
the battle-field some must fall and some be wounded ; 
the best fighter wins the day. But if they want to go 
further than this war of ivords, if they want to use the 
fist, your graces must interfere and banish them the 
country, and say : Keep your fists to yourselves, for that 
is our office: or else get ye hence! For we who are 
intrusted with God's Word should not fight with the 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



263 



fist ; ours is a spiritual strife, to win hearts and souls 
from the devil. To preach and suffer is our office; 
thus Christ and the apostles won souls with the Word 
of God. For they are not Christian who use their 
fists as well as the Word, and who are not rather 
prepared to endure all things." 

In order to make the antagonism between Luther 
and Miinzer more apparent, we will place the words 
of the revolutionist beside those of the reformer; 
reformation and revolution could not be represented in 
more startling contrast. With this view, we select a 
few of the strongest passages from Miinzer's writings ; 
for instance, his exhortation to an outbreak of the 
most violent and fanatic character, at once Judaical 
and communistic (1524) : 

" Behold, our lords and princes are the dregs of 
usurers, thieves, and robbers; 'they join house to 
house, lay field to field, till there be no place left, that 
they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth.' 
(Isaiah v.) With all that, they proclaim among the 
poor God's commandment, saying, 6 God hath com- 
manded : Thou shalt not steal;' but they do not take 
it to themselves. And they so afflict all men, the poor 
husbandman and mechanic and all that live. ' They 
eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from 
off them ; they break their bones, and chop them in 
pieces as for the pot, and their flesh as for the caul- 
dron' (Micah hi.) ; yet they will hang up the people if 



264 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

they take the least thing. To all this, i Amen/ says 
Doctor Liar. It is the fault of the masters if the 
poor become their foes; they will not do away with 
the cause of the insurrection, and how can it turn out 
well in the long-run ? If I say as much, I shall be 
accounted a rebel. So be it. 

" Christ hath commanded this solemnly, saying, 
6 Bring hither those mine enemies, and slay them 
before me.' Wherefore ? Wherefore, indeed ! because 
they corrupted Christ's government, and wanted to 
defend their own knavery under the appearance of 
Christian faith, and scandalise the whole world with 
their cloak of hypocrisy. Do not talk nonsense to us 
— that the power of God will suffice without the help 
of your sword; if so, it may rust in the scabbard. 
Would to God that every learned man, be he who he 
may, would tell you the same ! Christ hath said this 
plainly, in Matt. vii. : 6 Every tree that bringeth not 
forth good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire.' 

" If they wish to be spiritual, and yet will take no 
account of the knowledge of God (Peter hi.), they 
must be put away (1 Cor. v.) I pray for them wit'i ' 
pious Daniel, if they be not opposed to the revelation 
of God ; but if they do oppose it, let them be slain ivith- 
out mercy , as Bezekiah, Josiali, Cyrus, Elijah (1 Kings 
xviii), destroyed the priests of Baal ; otherwise the Chris- 
tian church loill not return to its original state. The 
weeds must he rooted, out of the vineyard of the Lord in 
the season of the harvest. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 265 

"God hath said (Deuteronomy vii.), Thou sbalt not 
show mercy on idolaters ; destroy their altars, break 
down their images and burn them, that mine anger 
may not be kindled against you. But if it be said 
that the apostles have not destroyed the idols of the 
heathen, I answer, that St. Peter was a fearful man, 
and dissembled with the Gentiles. (Gal. ii.) We must 
extirpate the wicked and idle Christians, if the princes 
will not do it." 

And he writes to the miners at Mansfeld (1525) : 
"All Germany, France, and Italy are awake. The 
Lord will give chase, and the wicked must flee. Let 
us on them ! let us on them ! It is the time for the 
wicked to tremble like dogs. Stir up the brethren, 
that they may obtain peace, and recover their stolen 
testimony. This is highly necessary, necessary 
beyond measure. On them ! on them ! — have no 
mercy, though Esau use kind words (Genesis xxxiii.). 
Give no heed to the misery of the ungodly : they will 
entreat you so kindly ; they will weep and wail like 
children ; have no mercy, as God hath commanded 
through Moses (Deut. vii.), and he hath revealed the 
same to us. Let not the blood grow cold upon your 
sivords. Smite Nimrod, bang bang (pinka pank) upon 
the anvil ; raze his tower to the ground. As long as they 
live, you cannot be rid of the fear of man. We can- 
not speak to you of God so long as they rule over you. 
On them ! on them I on them ! as long as it is day, God 



266 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

ffoetJi before you : follow ! You will find this history 
written in Matthew xxiv. Therefore be not alarmed ; 
God is with yon, as it is written (2 Chron. ii.), Thus 
saith God, Fear not ye, be not dismayed at this mul- 
titude ; it is not your battle, but the Lord's.' " 

In the same manner he wrote from Frankenhausen 
to Count Albrecht of Mansfeld : 

a "Written for the conversion of brother Albrecht 
of Mansfeld. 

" c Tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man 
that doeth evil.' (Rom. ii.) 

"I grieve that thou shouldst have misused Paul's 
epistle in such evil manner : thou thinkest to support 
the wicked government thereby to the uttermost, as 
the pope hath made hangmen (Stochmeister) of Peter 
and Paul. Thinkst thou that the Lord God, in his 
wrath, could not rouse up his people, void of under- 
standing, to depose the tyrants? (Hos. xiii. 8.) 

"Hath not the mother of Christ spoken of thee, 
and those like thee, through the Holy Ghost in 
prophecy ? (Luke i.) e He hath put down the mighty 
from their seats, and exalted them of low degree,' 
whom thou despisest. Hast thou found in thy Lutherisli 
porridge, and thy Wittenberg broth, what Ezehiel (ch. 
xxxvii.) 'prophesies? Neither couldst thou taste in 
thy Martin's peasant-dirt what the same prophet saith 
(ch. xxxix.), that God bids all the birds in the air 
devour the flesh of princes, and that the senseless 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 267 

beasts of the field shall drink the blood of the great 
multitude, as is described in Kev. xviii. 19 ? Knowest 
thou not that God careth more for his people than for 
you tyrants? Thou wilt be a heathen under the 
name of Christian and the cloak of Paul. But they 
will meet thee in thy way ; so look out ! If thou be 
ready to acknowledge (Dan. ix.) that the Lord hath 
given power to all Israel, and wilt appear before us 
and change thy faith, we will gladly agree to this, and 
receive thee as a brother; but if not, we shall take no 
account of thy lame and stale nonsense, but fight 
against thee as against the arch-enemy of Christendom. 
Give heed to this, and act accordingly. 

"Given at Frankenhausen, Friday after Jubilate, 
anno 1525. 

Thomas Munzer, 

With the sword of Gideon." 

Thus wrote the fanatic who had no better name 
for Luther than " the carnal, effeminate flesh at Wit- 
tenberg," " the prudish Babylonian woman," " arch- 
heathen," 6i Doctor Liar," " the Wittenberg pope," 
" hypocritical flatterer of princes," &c. 

Luther had dreaded for several years that matters 
might come to this extremity. Even in his " Admo- 
nition to all Christians to beware of Insurrection and 
Rebellion" (1522), he says, "that it appeared as if 
the discovery of papal deceit and tyranny would lead 



268 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

to an insurrection, during which priests, monks, 
bishops, with the whole clerical order, would run the 
risk of being turned out or killed; for the common 
people were determined not to bear any longer the 
injury to body, soul, and property, which had been 
inflicted on them hitherto ; and they had good cause 
for an attack with flails and clubs, as our Karstlians* 
threatened." Yet he entertains the hope that no 
general rising would take place, and carry the mass 
of the people along with it, because an end of the 
antichristian rule of the pope had been announced in 
Scripture, not through violence and insurrection, but 
through the Word of Christ. " For lying and deceit 
perish when once exposed ; they need no other blow, 
but fall and vanish in ignominy of themselves." 
Supported by this conviction, he had not hitherto 
been persuaded to take the defensive against those 
who threatened with hand and flail, for he believed 
that a general scramble (Antasten) need not be feared. 
Still the people must be pacified, and be told to 
suppress even all desires and expressions that lead to 
rebellion, and undertake nothing against the powers 
that be ; for what is done by orderly means cannot be 
considered rebellion : " for rebellion hath no common 
sense, and more, often injures the innocent than the 
guilty; therefore rebellion cannot be right, however 
just the cause; more injury than benefit is ever the 



* Husbandman : derived from an agricultural implement. Karst. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 2C9 

result of it. Therefore respect authority as long as 
it does not tyrannise and oppress ; hut keep hand, 

and heart, and tongue still " I take, and always 

will take his part, wJio suffers from rebellion, however 
unjust his cause may be ; and will set myself against 
him who rebels, let his cause be ever so just ; because 
rebellion cannot take place without injury and the 
shedding of innocent blood! 1 

But while cautioning the lower orders against 
rebellion, he was perfectly conscious that this was 
only one half of his task; with equal earnestness 
he admonished the princes, whose duty it was to 
suppress insurrection. To those who, under the 
pretext of obedience to the emperor, prevented the 
preaching of the Gospel, he said, with noble indigna- 
tion : " Were the emperor to take from you castle or 
town, we should soon see how cunningly you would 
prove that you need not obey the emperor; but now, 
when you seek to grind down the poor man, and 
meddle audaciously with God's Word, you call it 
obedience to the emperor. Such persons were 
formerly called rogues : now we must term them 
obedient Christian princes. . * . Such are your princes 
that govern our German land : hence the wondrous 
prosperity throughout the country!" 

He then draws the portrait of a true Christian 
prince : " A true Christian prince should assuredly 
divest himself of the idea of ruling by violence ; for 



270 



MARTIN LUTHER, 



AND THE 



cursed is his life who liveth and labours for himself 
alone; cursed all works that do not flow from love. 
A prince should exercise justice as firmly as he wields 
the sword; and let his reason determine when and 
where physical force should be applied, and with 
what degree of severity : so that reason should at all 
times govern law, and ever be the supreme authority. 
. . . . For when love directs the judgment, you can 
decide in all cases without your law-books; but ivhen 
you shut your eyes against the laiv of love and nature, 
your judgment will never please God, even though ye 
had swallowed all the law-books in the world. ... A 
righteous judgment should not and cannot be taken 
from books, but must be pronounced from free un- 
fettered thought. But love and natural law, — the voice 
of reason itself, — ever utter such righteous judgment. 
From books we get nothing but laboured, doubtful 
judgments. . . . Therefore should written law be 
accounted below reason, from whence it flows as the 
fountain of justice; nor should we suffer the fountain 
to be confined to its narrow channel, nor reason to 
the letter of the law." Eemarkable words these in 
the mouth of the German Reformer, which prove to 
us his true and lively perception of the insufficiency 
of mere formal law; and how clearly be recognised 
the desire of human nature to obtain for the inherent 
sentiment of justice its due weight by the side of the 
law as incorporated in codes — a desire which, among 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



271 



all free nations, originates the demand for the public 
and oral administration of justice. 

" A prince therefore/' in Luther's opinion, " should 
not rely on codes or jurists, but on God alone; 
importune him, and pray to him for wisdom to govern 
his subjects well. I can lay down no law for a 
prince, but would only direct his heart how it should 

feel and decide in all matters of law and justice 

Let him not think, Law and people are mine ; I will 
do as I like with them ; — but reflect thus : I belong 
to the law and the people ; I must do what will be 
useful and good for them ; I must not aim at 
tyrannical rule, but how I may peaceably direct and 
defend them. ... Of this I am sure, that the Word 
of God will not bend and give w T ay to princes, but 
princes must give way to it. It is enough for me to 
show that it is not impossible for a prince to be a 
Christian, although rare and difficult." Here we see 
already the great weight he attaches to the important 
truth, that princely functions are not mere private 
privileges (according to certain modern theories,) but 
involve, above all, a moral responsibility. 

When the peasants' war, that movement so lament- 
able in its consequences, had overrun a great part of 
Germany, Luther still maintained the lofty position 
of Christian mediator and witness for the truth 
between prince and people. Raised above the fear 
of man, and never losing sight of eternal truth and 



272 



M A K T I N LUTHE R, A N D THE 



the divine judgments, he attacked both parties 
equally with the lightning vigour of his daring mind. 
In his "Exhortation to Peace, or the Twelve Articles 
of the Peasants' Charter in Swabia," he first repre- 
sented, in a striking way, the importance and peril 
of this terrible crisis : " Should this rebellion proceed 
and get the upper hand, both kingdoms (the king- 
dom of God and of this world) must perish : neither 
temporal rule nor the Vv'ord of God would prevail, 
but endless convulsions throughout Germany would 
ensue. It is therefore necessary to speak and advise 
freely on the subject, without respect to persons." 

He then addresses the rulers and princes : a In the 
first place, there is no one on earth we have to thank 
more than you for this mischief and insurrection, ye 
princes and rulers, especially ye blind bishops, mad 
priests, and monks, who cease not to rail and rage 
against the holy Gospel : moreover, in your temporal 
rule ye do nothing but plunder and oppress, to support 
your pomps and vanities, until the poor common 
people neither can nor ought to endure it any longer. 
The sword is at your throat : ye still think yourselves 
-so firm in your saddles, that you cannot be unhorsed; 
this confidence and obstinate temerity will break 
your neck ; you will see that. For be it known unto 
you, that God hath so ordered it, that your violence 
neither will nor ought to be borne with any longer. 
You must change, and submit to God's Word. If you 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



273 



do not comply willingly and cheerfully, you will be 
forced to do it by violent and destructive means. If 
the peasants do it not, others must : and though you 
defeat them all, yet are they not defeated : God will 
raise up others ; for he hath decreed your destruction, 
and he will destro} 7 you. They are not peasants who 
oppose you ; it is God himself who opposes you, to 
chastise your fury." 

To those who threw upon his doctrine the blame 
of having caused this insurrection, Luther replied : 
" You, as well as every one, can testify that I have 
taught quietly, and exhorted all good subjects to 
obey even your tyrannical authorities ; this insurrec- 
tion, therefore, cannot be laid to my charge. But 
false prophets — as much my foes as yours — have got 
among the people ; for three years they have gone in 
and out among them, and no one hath opposed them 
so stanchly as myself. If, then, God will now punish 
you, and has suffered the devil, by means of his false 
prophets, to stir up the distracted mob against you, 
what can I or my gospel do in the matter ? . . . . And 
if I had a desire for vengeance, I might laugh in my 
sleeve and look on, or even join the peasants and 
help to make things worse; but God preserve me 
from that now as before !" 

He further insists, that princes and rulers should 
accede to all reasonable demands : " The peasants 
have proposed twelve articles, among which there 
18 



274 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

are some so reasonable and just, that they leave you 

without excuse before God and the world It is 

true they are nearly all intended to promote the 
interest of the peasants. .... I might bring other 
articles against you which concern Germany and 
government, as I have done in my book " To the 
German Nobility;" but as you have given these to 
the winds, you must now listen to and put up with 

articles of this selfish spirit You cannot reject 

the first article, which claims for them the privilege 
of hearing the Gospel, and the right of electing their 

own pastors Authority must not prevent a 

man from teaching and believing what he wishes, be 
it gospel or lie ; it is enough to prevent the teaching 
of rebellion and disorder. The other articles, having 
reference to temporal burdens, are, of a truth, just 
and right ; for authority hath not been instituted for 
its own profit and caprice, at the expense of the 
subject, but to do what it best can for the good of the 
subject. Now it is not possible to bear for long such 
plunder and oppression." 

On the other hand, he urged this chiefly on the 
peasants : to keep a good conscience with regard to 
this matter; even if conquered, they would still be 
victorious, and save their souls; but in the other 
case, they would lose body and soul, even if they 
triumphed for a time and slew all the princes. " The 
most important point is, not how powerful you are, or 



REFORMATION IK GERMANY. 275 

how much in the wrong others are ; but how you may 
keep a conscience void of offence." 

He now shows how that both human and divine 
laws forbid violent attempts at self-defence in the 
body politic; and proves, from the words of Christ 
and his apostles, that evangelical Christianity and 
political insurrection are incompatible : " As you 
boast of the name of Christians, you will assuredly 
bear with the denial of your Christian rights. Now 
listen, beloved Christians ; thus saith your Lord and 
Master Christ, whose name you bear: 6 But I say unto 
you, that ye resist not evil; but ivhosoever shall smite 
thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also ; and 
if any man will sue thee at the law and take away thy 
coat, let him have thy cloak also ; and ivhosoever shall 
compel thee to go a mile, go ivith him twain. 9 

"How do your projects agree with this law? Ye 
will not suffer wrong or injustice, but desire to be 
free; .... then put away the Christian name, and 

boast of another In these texts a child may see 

what is true Christian right : not to resist wrong, not 
to draw the sword, not to defend or avenge oneself, 
but to resign body and goods, that he who robs may 
rob on : we have sufficient in our Lord, who will not 
forsake us. . . . To suffer and bear the cross is the 

Christian's privilege ; this and no other What 

doth Christ himself do when they crucify him ? — he 
giveth himself up to Him who judgeth righteously, 



276 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

and suffereth the unbearable wrong. Besides, he 
prayed for his persecutors : 6 Father, forgive them/ 
. ... If you are true Christians, you must indeed do 
the same, and follow this example. If you do not, then 
renounce the Christian name and your boast of 
Christian privilege ; for then you are assuredly not 
Christians, but opposed to Christ and his law." 

The entire weight of these remonstrances to the 
peasant-league rests, as we see, on the leading 
principle, that their appeal to the Gospel and to 
Christian right was wholly inadmissible in political 
questions, because true Christianity could never 
depart from its purely spiritual and inward nature ; 
he, therefore, who would seriously invoke the 
sanction of Christianity could take no other way, 
amidst the pressure of the outer world, than that of 
utter self-denial, of calm trust in God, and submission 
to His righteousness. It was Luther's great object to 
preserve the spiritual character of the Reformation 
and of Christianity intact, uncorrupted, and unem- 
barrassed by movements of an entirely opposite 
nature. Advancing in this direction, he must arrive 
at a conclusion, the immeasurable importance of 
which was known or fully appreciated neither by his 
own nor subsequent times; the conclusion, namely, 
that genuine Christianity, in the true original spirit 
of the Founder and Head of the church, was, upon 
the whole, only the business of a few, and that this 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 277 

had never been otherwise : " Dear friends, the Chris- 
tians are not so numerous, that so many could 
assemble in a crowd; a Christian is a rare bird. 
"Would to God that the greater number of us were 
pious heathens even, who kept the natural law, to 
say nothing about Christian law." Have we not 
already in this thought, if we carry it out fearlessly, 
the germ of all those changes towards which the 
relation between church and state, religion and eccle- 
siastical establishments, national church and sects in 
modern times, more and more pointedly tend ? It 
was therefore his proposition, to bring about peace, to 
reconcile these differences by means of impartial 
arbitration ; to adjust by moral, not by physical, force 
the relation between the powers that be and the 
subject; and to purify and ennoble it more and more 
by the progressive influence of the spirit of the Gospel. 
" Not that I intend to justify or defend the intolerable 
injustice you endure from your governments (I admit 
their horrible injustice;) but this is what I desire: 
that if neither party will take advice, none of them 
can be called Christians ; but let them, according to 
the course of this world, fight it out, and God punish 
one rogue by the other. Poor sinful man that I am, 
I know that I have a just cause when I fight for the 
Christian name, and pray it may not be disgraced. . . . 
Such comfort and confidence in praying ye cannot 
have; for conscience and Scripture prove that you 



278 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

act like heathens, and not like Christians. I know 
also that none of you have called upon God in this 
matter ; for ye dare not raise your eyes towards him, 
but set him at naught with your fists. But if ye 
were Christians, ye would cleave to 'our Father,' 
carry your cause to God in prayer, and say, c thy will 
be done; deliver us from evil.' The true Christian 
way to be delivered from evil and misery, is patiently 
to endure and to cry to God. But as Christ hath no 
lot or part in either side, and nothing Christian is 
pending between you, and both nobles and peasants 
strive only for heathenish and worldly justice and 
temporal advantage, for God's sake be advised and set 
about it lawfully, and not with violence, that ye may 

not deluge Germany with blood Ye nobles have 

history and Scripture against you, showing how 

tyrants are punished Ye peasants also have 

both Scripture and experience against you, which 

prove that rebellion never prospers If ye will 

not follow my advice, I give you up ; but I am inno- 
cent of your blood — be it on your own heads ! Ye 
nobles, fight not against Christians, but against public 
robbers, a disgrace to the Christian name; those 
among them who will be slain are already damned 
eternally. Again, ye peasants, fight not against 
Christ, but against tyrants, enemies of God and man, 
and against the murderers of Christ's saints ; those 
of them who perish are likewise eternally damned. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 279 

This is God's assured sentence against you both 

As for me and mine, we will entreat God that he may 
either reconcile and unite you, or mercifully frustrate 
your devices." 

His hopes "that the strife might be appeased, if 
not altogether in a Christian spirit, yet according to 
human laws and treaties," were not to be realised, 
owing, as he had foreseen, equally to faults on both 
sides. The fearful tragedy of the " German peasant 
war" could not be averted ; the German soil was 
saturated by the blood shed in a horrible civil war, 
the guilt of which rested equally on the brutality 
and lawlessness of the masses, as on the hardness of 
heart and treachery of several of the victorious 
governments. 

When Luther received intelligence of the acts of 
violence committed by the peasants in more than one 
district, of the danger of an impending "terrorism" 
from the insurgent masses and their fanatical leaders, 
he abandoned the conciliatory course he had hitherto 
pursued, and directed the full measure of his wrath, 
the whole weight of his word and influence, against 
the insurrection, the immediate suppression of which 
he declared to be the first and most urgent duty of 
the governments. He did this principally in the 
pamphlet entitled, "'Against the plundering murder- 
ing Peasantry" (May 1525). 

"In my former writing," he says, "I would not 



280 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

harshly judge the peasants, because they were willing 
to submit to justice and be better instructed. But 
before I had time to look round, they proceeded to 
blows, plundered and destroyed like mad dogs, show- 
ing plainly the devices of their false hearts 

They are doing nought but the devil's work ; and he 
especially is the arch-devil who reigns at Miihlhausen 
(Thomas Miinzer,) and commits theft, murder, and 

bloodshed Because, then, their deeds are 

different from their words, I must write of them in a 
different style, and instruct the conscience of the 
temporal power how to act." 

Rebellion now appeared to him as the most fearful 
evil that could afflict a country; as the desolating 
strife of the elements, as fire and blood, against which 
extreme measures are not only permitted, but a 
sacred duty : " Rebellion is not ordinary murder, but 
conflagration, which fires and consumes a whole 
country. Therefore smite, slay, stab, secretly or 
openly, whoever can; and remember that there is 
nothing more venomous, pernicious, and devilish than 
a rebel. Slay him like a mad dog; if thou killest 
him not, he will kill thee, and a whole country with 
thee. A prince and governor must remember that 
he is God's deputy and the minister of His wrath, to 
whom the sword is intrusted to punish such villains. 
For if he can punish and doth not, he is guilty of all 
the murder and mischief which these villains commit. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 281 

This is no time for slumber, nor for patience or 
mercy ; it is a time for the sword ; a season of wrath, 
and not of grace. Therefore let the authorities 
advance with good courage, and smite home with a 
safe conscience, as long as the blood flows in their 
veins They may appeal to God with all tran- 
quillity of heart, and say : 6 Lo, God, thou hast 
appointed me to be a prince and ruler, and hast 
intrusted me with the sword to punish the evil-doer. 
(Eom. xiii.) Thou hast spoken, and cannot lie; 
therefore I must discharge my trust at peril of thy 
favour; it is manifest that these peasants in many 
ways have deserved death, before thee and the world. 
If it is thy will that I should perish by their hands, 
so be it, thy will be done; I shall die and perish in 
obedience to thy commandment and word/ . . . . 
Thus he who is slain in the cause of authority will 
be a true martyr before God, if he fight in this con- 
viction, for he walks in the word of God, and 
obedience. On the contrary, he who falls in the 
cause of the peasants is a brand that will burn for 
ever in hell-fire, for he uses the sword against God's 
word and commandment. We live in such strange 
times, that a prince can serve God with blood-shed 

better than others with prayer Therefore, my 

good lords, see to it that ye set free, save, help, and 
have mercy on those poor people (compelled by the 
peasants, against their will, to join their league;) 



282 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

then stab, slay, and kill the rest, who can ! If you 
perish in doing this, it will be well with you ; a more 
blessed death you cannot die. You die in obeying 
God's command, and in the service of love ; in saving 
your neighbour from the bonds of the devil. I pray 
you, then, let all who can, flee from the peasants as 
from the devil himself ; but those who will not flee, I 
pray God to enlighten and convert them. As for 
those who cannot be converted, may they never 
prosper ! To this let all true Christians say, Amen." 

Luther most likely felt the reproaches to which he 
exposed himself by these violent expressions, for he 
concludes his address with the words : " If any one 
think this too severe, let him reflect that rebellion is 
not to be tolerated, and that the destruction of all 
temporal power may be expected every hour." This 
did not, however, prevent many of his contemporaries, 
Protestants and Catholics, from censuring, more or 
less loudly, this merciless rigour and cruelty ; and the 
same reproach has been reiterated again and again, 
from that time to this. It is quite true that there is 
something in these inflammatory words repugnant 
alike to friends and enemies. They furnish another 
instance of that license and intemperance of expres- 
sion, which he could never control when writing or 
speaking under the influence of strong emotion. An 
enemy might assert that the massacre of the peasants 
was urged by him with the same fanatical spirit with 



REFORMATION IN 



GERMANY. 



which, a few centuries before, the infuriated Domi- 
nicans preached the extermination of the Alb senses. 
It is nevertheless an element in Luther's greatness, 
that he clings with such tenacity to the religious 
character of his task and vocation ; and when this 
was menaced by the breaking-out of the insurrection, 
he evoked every energy for its suppression ; he even 
invested this resistance with the sanctity of a divine 
and Christian act. Nor must we forget that the 
violent and apparently merciless spirit of his appeals 
for the suppression of the revolt by the sword must 
be looked upon, without doubt, as a direct reply to 
the cruel and incendiary addresses of Miinzer and his 
associates. The most severe measures adopted by the 
authorities for the suppression of the revolt, when 
compared with the horrors of anarchy and the abomi- 
nations of mob-rule, appeared to him as an actual 
blessing, a strong medicine, an inevitable though 
painful remedy. 

The violent communistic (that is to say, despoiling) 
tendency which prevailed, partially and especially 
through Miinzer, in the movement of the peasants, 
professedly resting on scriptural grounds, was also 
opposed by Luther with direct appeals to Scripture : 
" It is of no use for the peasants to assert, that in 
the 1st of Genesis all things are said to be created for 
the free and common use of all, and that we have 
all been baptised alike. For in the New Testament 



284 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

Moses is of no account : there we find Christ is our 
master, who subjects us, body and goods, to the 
emperor and temporal authority, saying : 6 Give unto 
Caesar the things which are Caesar's/ Thus also St. 
Paul says to all baptised Christians : ' Let every one 
be subject to the powers that be.' Baptism only 
makes the soul free, not body and property. Neither 
doth the Gospel make our possessions common, except 
in the case of him who doth so of his own accord, 
like the apostles and disciples, who did not require 
that the property of strangers, such as Pilate and 
Herod, should be held in common, as our senseless 
peasants rave, but merely their own possessions. But 
our peasants will have a share in the goods of other 
people, and keep their own to themselves : clever 
Christians they ! I think there are no more devils in 
hell; they have all entered into the peasants." 



The sword of princes and rulers speedily subdued 
the insurrection, by the slaughter of the leaders and 
their misguided followers. Every act of cruelty and 
excess committed by the rebels was now avenged by 
the conquerors, in most places with double and treble 
cruelty and severity ; so that Luther uttered again a 
cry of distress and indignation on hearing of it : 
"Alas, I have feared it! Had the peasants become 
masters, the devil would have been abbot ; but now, 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



2S5 



as these unchristian, bloodthirsty tyrants are again 
masters, the devil's mother will be abbess !" 

When the insurrection was suppressed, Luther was 
able to return to the tranquil prosecution of his work. 
He was permitted to achieve what is rarely accom- 
plished by the originator of a great movement, — 
namely, to check the revolution without giving up 
the reformation. It is true that his success in these 
critical moments must be attributed to his alliance 
with the temporal powers and to their assistance 
No leader of the French and English revolution 
succeeded in solving a similar problem : Mirabeau 
and Pym were snatched away by death before they 
even made an attempt to stem the revolutionary 
torrent, and Lafayette was crushed in the endeavour. 

The maintaining of his principle was doubtless 
connected with the keenest sufferings of Luther's 
spirit. Had he not cause to reproach himself, in his 
retirement, with having contributed, by the intempe- 
rate, irascible, and inflammatory words of his earlier 
years, to this sanguinary result ? Did he not see the 
future political condition of his country, and the 
progress of the Keformation, incalculably impeded and 
retarded by these revolutionary attempts? Was he 
not himself so materially changed in consequence of 
this struggle against the religious and political revolu- 
tion, that a remarkable contrast is observable between 
the Luther of 1520 and 1525 ? 



286 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

In the struggle against Rome he hecame conscious of 
{he strength and depth of his opinions ; in the struggle 
against the revolution he perceived their peril and 
limitation. 



FOURTH SKETCH. 

THE REFORMER AND HIS WORK. 

The great change which had taken place in the 
position of affairs during the eight years (1517-1525) 
which had elapsed since Luther's entrance on public 
life, will be clearly perceived if we consider for a 
moment the condition of his friends and enemies. 
From among the leaders in the work of civilisation 
who had principally promoted the great religious 
movement, one, Reuchlin, was now on the point of 
death; another, Hutten, had found a solitary grave 
as an exile on one of the islands of the Lake of 
Zurich ; a third, the most influential of all, Erasmus, 
had abandoned the cause when it gave rise to violent 
commotion. Popular literature, at first so powerful 
an instrument in these changes, became in one direc- 
tion a tool of the most destructive radicalism, and in 
another had already experienced the influence of 
Catholic re-action; while it is true the purest ai>d best 




LUTHER CONTINUES HIS TRANSLATION OF THE BIBLE WITH THE 
ASSISTANCE OF MELANCHTHON 1523-4. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 287 

organs of the time still adhered to the hero of Worms, 
whom Hans Sachs hailed as the " Wittenberg nightin- 
gale." Luther saw his emperor, the chief of the 
nation, in the toils of the Romanists, unable to appre- 
ciate the bent of the German mind and the spirit of 
the Reformation, and many German princes opposing 
the new doctrine with deadly enmity. He also saw 
the flower of the Franconian knights, who had 
espoused the cause of the Reformation, cut off and 
dispersed by the downfall of Sickingen ; the peasantry, 
after a fatal insurrection, slaughtered by thousands; 
and the survivors more completely enslaved than 
before. 

How complete the change since the time when 
hopes still existed that the whole nation would possibly 
follow with one accord the Gospel banner of freedom 
and love! Now, Luther could only rely on one or 
two reigning princes, on a circle of faithful friends, 
and on the stanch devoted heart of the people. 
Above all this, however, he trusted in the sanctity of 
his cause and the protection of God. 

Hitherto we have endeavoured to survey the depth 
of his character and his abiding influence in three 
distinct ways : by considering the history of his 
gradual mental training up to his liberation from the 
shackles of popery ; then in his struggle against the 
corruptions of the ancient church ; and lastly, in his 
opposition to extreme innovation. 



288 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

Our remaining task is to bring before the reader the 
leading features of the Protestant organisation as 
emanating from him; to portray himself in his 
ministerial and domestic relations ; and conclude by 
tracing the result of his work in succeeding cen- 
turies. 

LUTHER FOUNDER OF A NEW CHURCH. 

To form a correct estimate of Luther as the founder 
of a new church, we must not lose sight of the fact 
that it formed in the first instance no part of his in- 
tention to become the originator of a new church. 

The purification of the existing church from her 
corruption, her liberation from the tyranny under 
which she groaned, was Luther's grand principle in 
assailing the papacy : it made him the teacher of his 
nation. 

The force of circumstances, and the imperious 
demands of the hour, compelled him, almost against 
his will, to devise measures of organisation, and to 
assist in laying the foundation of a new order of 
i things in the more immediate sphere of his influence. 
In the beginning, however, nothing could have been 
farther from his thoughts than the design of becoming 
the head of a party, or the founder of the system 
which, in a more narrow and confined sense, has been 
denominated Lutheranism. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 289 

He protests against this with the strongest expres- 
sions in his " Admonitions" (1522) : "I beseech you, 
above all tilings, not to use my name ; not to call your- 
selves Lutherans, but Christians. What is Luther ? 
The doctrine is not mine ; I have been crucified for 
no one. Paul would not suffer the Christians to say : 
I am of Paul ; or, I am of Peter ; but, I am Christ's. 
How, then, can the followers of Christ call themselves 
after the unsanctified name of a poor stinking mass 
of corruption (stinkender Madensach), such as I am? 
Let us blot out all 'party-names, and call ourselves 
Christians, as we follow Christ's doctrine. The 
papists have justly a party-name ; because, unsatisfied 
with Christ's name and doctrine, they will be popish 
too. Let them be called after the pope, their master. 
Lam and will be no mails master. In common with 
my brethren (der Gemeine), / hold the only universal 
(einige gemeine) doctrine of Christ, who alone is our 
master." 

The irresistible progress of the religious movement 
proved to him unequivocally that a greater power was 
at work than that of a mere weak individual : "It is 
not our work that is now going on in the world; it is 
not possible that a human being could alone commence 
and carry on so great a scheme. It has, indeed, 
gone thus far without my thought and planning; it 
will be brought to a good end without my counsel, 
and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. 
19 



290 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

There is another who turns the wheel, whom the 
papists see not, but lay the blame on us." He then 
comprises in a few words the substance of what he 
considered at that time the legitimate working of the 
Reformation : " Obey the Gospel, and help others to 
do so ; teach, write, and preach that human laws are 
nothing; prevent and dissuade any one from becoming 
a monk, priest, or nun ; and let those who are in the 
cloister come out of it. Give no more money for 
bulls, tapers, bells, and churches ; but maintain that a 
Christian life consists in faith and love. Persist in 
this for two years, and you will see what will become 
of pope, bishops, cardinals, priests, monks, nuns, 
masses, and the whole swarm of popish vermin 
(Geschwiirm und Gewilrm.) It will vanish like smoker 
Thus we see his confidence in the power of the 
evangelical doctrine was so great, that he fully 
expected the mere promulgation and obeying it would 
suffice to dissipate as a vapour the papacy, with the 
entire Romish church, of which the pope was only 
the head ; whose place pure Christianity, the life of 
faith and love, would then occupy. He regarded 
faith and love as the sum of evangelical Christianity, 
as he has already explained in his treatise " Of the 
Liberty of a Christian;" designating the essence of 
inward Christianity as faith, and the external active 
influence as love. We shall not therefore err, if we 
conclude that a more profound and lively conception of 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 291 

faith and love appeared to him prominently at the 
outset as the essence of the Reformation, This was, 
consciously or unconsciously, the motive power of his 
entire life, giving sublimity to his vocation, and 
rendering imperishable the result of his mission as 
the reformer of Christendom, by the revival of true 
religion from her spiritual and original sources. 
These spiritual and original sources are nowhere to 
be found but in true faith and pure love. 

But it was of incalculable importance that both 
should be understood and made effectual in a vivify- 
ing manner, and in the true spirit of the Gospel, as 
the life-giving principle of the new epoch, and of 
purified and liberated religion. Luther and refor- 
mation gave the impulse which accomplished this • and 
the immortal merit of this achievement is the royal 
diadem which no subsequent age nor generation can 
pluck from Luther s brow. But we do not hesitate 
one moment to express even now the conviction 
which pervades our whole account of his work, that 
this impulse must not be confounded with a perfect 
religious system complete in itself At this point, 
indeed, Lutheranism and Calvinism, narrow, 
exclusive, and self-sufficient, separate from free and 
comprehensive evangelical Protestantism. The object 
sought by Luther and the Reformation, in its first 
movement, was the revival and regeneration of Chris- 
tianity, by an earnest return to personal religion, and 



292 MAR TIX LUTHER, AXD THE 

by penetrating deeply into the ancient written 
sources of the religion of the Saviour of the world. 
Both paths led to the two fundamental principles of 
evangelical Protestantism (known in theological 
language as the material and formal principle of the 
Reformation:) justification through faith alone; and 
the sole authority of the holy Scriptures as the true 
record of primitive Christianity. 

Both these principles are meant as a more accurate 
explanation and definition of that which Luther and 
the Reformation expressed by the word faith; a word 
which has created, down to our time, a whole sea of 
error, misinterpretations, and contradictions. The 
key to their true apprehension will be found in the 
opposite principles which they were originally in- 
tended to resist. The doctrine of justification by 
faith alone, stood opposed to the Romish notion of the 
necessity of good works to salvation, — works signi- 
fying certain exercises and penances prescribed by the 
church; w T hile the doctrine of the sole and all-suffi- 
cient authority of the Scriptures was meant to over- 
throw the popish doctrine of the authority and neces- 
sity of tradition. In both these principles, the great 
results of Luther's religious experience are forcibly 
shown : they were essentially the product of his 
inward and outward struggle ; the watchword of his 
liberation, and of the hostile position he assumed 
against Rome. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 293 

The grace of God and not our own merit, God's 
Word and not mans doctrine, was the salient point of 
this antagonism, as he then apprehended it, and as he 
subsequently, after a long interval, finally established 
it. The doctrine of justification by faith was in his 
view a complete denial of individual merit ; con- 
ducing absolutely to the glorifying of God's grace, 
and to the blessed salvation of sinful men. It was 
the view of Augustine, based upon certain principles 
of the Apostle Paul, which governed him uncon- 
ditionally in his conception of the relation between 
sin and redemption, God and man, the freedom and 
bondage of the human will, and impelled him to the 
most daring and stringent conclusions of his belief in 
predestination. He who has reached that stage in 
his knowledge of Christianity, from which he regards 
the Augustine view no longer as the highest and only 
valid exposition of the Gospel, but as one grand 
attempt, among others equally legitimate, to embody 
in human words and ideas the inconceivable and 
unfathomable mystery of divine love, will also 
perceive the necessity of a marked distinction in that 
fundamental doctrine of Luther and of the Reforma- 
tion. The way and manner in which Luther gradu- 
ally conceived this doctrine in his mind, how he 
adopted and expressed it, shows us (in a large sense) 
only the temporal and perishable shell in which the 
kernel of an imperishable religious principle was to 



294 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

attain maturity : it was, to make use of an analogous 
figure, the tree girt about with thorns, the fruit of 
which was destined to supply present and future 
generations with delicious refreshment ; and it is this 
fruit which aids Christianity in preserving its spiritual, 
life-giving power. For as long as this banner of Pro- 
testantism is reared on high, the most profound and 
essential truth of the Christian religion can never, 
for any length of time, be misconceived or lost : that 
truth, that the awful abyss between the Creator and 
the creature, between God and man, can only be 
bridged over by the mystery of grace, that is, free and 
saving love ; and that its trustful reception and appro- 
priation (consequently the conversion, salvation, and 
blessedness of man) takes place in the inward 
sanctuary of the human soul, and is therefore a work 
of faith, depending on nothing external. With this 
truth, the religion of the heart, — the deep, uncon- 
querable, and ever-renovating character of Christianity, 
— stands or falls ; in this sense the Lutheran doctrine 
of justification by faith remains an imperishable 
bulwark of the Gospel. 

We may accept these essential and fundamental 
points of Protestantism fully and with absolute and 
steadfast conviction, and nevertheless reject, clearly 
and decidedly, the assumptions, the dogmatic and 
scholastic formula3 and deductions, with which Luther 
has invested this true and fundamental principle. 



REFORMATION I If GERMANY. 295 

Every one who has the courage and ability to draw 
his faith directly from a serious study of the Scrip- 
tures, and from individual experience in a truly 
evangelical and Protestant sense, will be compelled 
to assert this right with reference to nearly all the 
principal points of Luther's doctrine, rather than 
submit to scholastic formula? prepared by one party 
or the other for his unconditional acceptance. Indeed, 
Luther's mind itself vacillated incessantly on the im- 
movable pivot of a few leading maxims ; his convic- 
tions varying in form and tenour, as he was tossed to 
and fro in the struggle, driven by this party or by 
that, by the superstition, scepticism, or fanaticism of 
his opponents. 

Luther's position with reference to the authority of 
the Scriptures was exactly similar. His trust in it 
was so unimpeachable, that faith in the divine origin 
of the Bible became as an unquestionable fact, the 
dominant idea of his whole remaining life. Still his 
reliance on the Scriptures was, without doubt, in- 
fluenced by the fundamental doctrine of justification 
by faith, so that the sum-total of Christianity 
appeared to him to be contained in the leading truth 
which he simply designated the " Gospel," in respect 
to which the remaining topics of the Scriptures were 
frequently thrust into the background. "Christian 
faith," he asserts, "is the belief that man is justified 
and saved without works \ and so resigns himself, and 



296 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

all he can do, as to rely on the merits of Christ alone. 
I stand not alone in this ; I am not the only one, not 
even the first, who hath said, faith alone justifieth: 
Ambrose hath said it before me, also Augustine, and 
many others ; and whoever can read and understand 
St. Paid must say the same, and not otherwise, for his 
words are so strong, and admit of no works." So 
assured was he that St. Paul's doctrine of justification 
through faith, that glorious keystone of Christianity, 
was in fact the essence of the Gospel, that he 
ventured — solely to give more decided prominence to 
this fundamental principle — on the hazardous and 
unwarrantable step of an arbitrary addition, in 
harmony, it is true, with the spirit and connexion of 
the original. It is well known that he ventured on 
the introduction of the word u allein (alone) in 
Eomans iii. 28, which is not found in the original 
Greek : " Therefore we conclude that a man is 
justified by faith (alone), without the deeds of the 
law." He defended himself against the reproaches to 
which this liberty taken with the text justly exposed 
him, in a manner coarse and defiant, but by no means 
satisfactory. " Therefore shall it remain in my New 
Testament; and though it drive your popish asses 
wild, they shall not make me leave it out." Among 
the reasons he assigns for this act of daring are, 
independent of the peculiar case and the character of 
the German language, also the example of the fathers, 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



297 



an ( the peril of the people : " They would rely on 
works, and be wanting in faith, and so lose Christ; 
especially in these times, when they have so long been 
accustomed to works." 

He applied this rule not only to single passages, but 
to measure the value and importance of entire books 
of the New Testament, and made it at times an 
absolute canon of scriptural criticism : " You must," 
he said, '-judge fairly of all the books (of the Bible), 
and decide which are the best : for instance, the 
gospel of St. John and the epistles of Paul, especially 
that to the Romans, and the first epistle of Peter, 
are the pith and marrow of all the hooks; they ought, 
indeed, to be the first; and I would advise every 
Christian to read them first and most often, and make 
them, by daily study, as familiar as daily bread. For 
in these thou findest but few works and miracles of 
Christ recorded; but thou findest described in a 
masterly way, how faith in Christ conquers sin, death, 
and hell, and giveth life, righteousness, and salvation — 
which is the true nature of the Gospel. For if I must 
do either without the works or the teaching of Christ, 
I would rather be without the works than without 
any portion of the preaching: the works do not help 
me, but his words; they give life as He himself. 
Now as John hath recorded few of Christ's works, 
but much of his preaching; the three other evan- 
gelists, on the contrary, many of his works (?), few 



298 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

of his words, — the gospel of John is the only living 
true heart-gospel — to be preferred before, and 
estimated more highly, than the other three. In the 
same way, the epistles of Paul and Peter excel the 
three gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. In 
fine, the gospel of John and the epistles of Paul, 
especially those to the Romans, Galatians, and Ephe- 
sians, also the first epistle of Peter, — these are the 
books which show thee C hrist, and teach all that it is 
necessary to know for thy salvation, even wert thou 
never to see or hear any other book or doctrine. In the 
same way, the epistle of J ames is truly one of straw ; 
for, indeed, it hath nothing evangelical about it. In 
this one thing all the truly sacred books agree : they 
all of them preach Christ, and set him forth. This is 
the true touchstone by which to judge books — whether 
they set forth Christ or not; since all Scripture 
exhibits Christ, and will know nothing but Christ. 
Whatsoever doth not teach Christ is not apostolic, though 
Peter or Paul taught it; on the other hand, what- 
soever teacheth Christ is apostolical, although it were 
the work of Judas, Annas, or Herod." 

He asserts this principle of the boldest, and at the 
same time most dogmatic criticism, with a daring and 
candour before which the idolatrous adherence of 
later Protestant divines to the letter of the Scriptures 
would recoil : " The epistle to the Hebrews appears to 
me composed of many pieces; but it speaks in a 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 299 

thorough, masterly way of the priesthood of Christ, 
and expounds the Old Testament fully and with 
precision ; so that it is plainly the work of a man of 
sound learning, experienced in the faith, and conver- 
sant with the Scriptures, a disciple of the apostles, 
and who learnt much from them. And although he 
does not lay the foundation of faith, which is the 
function of the apostles, yet he buildeth thereon gold, 
silver, and precious stones. Therefore must we not 
take offence if wood, straw, or hay be mingled with 
it, but ought to receive such good doctrine in all 
honour ; only we must not place it on a level with 
the apostolic epistles. The epistle of James I do not 
consider as the writing of an apostle at all, for these 
reasons : first, that it ascribes justification to works, 
in direct contradiction to Paul and all the other 
sacred writers ; secondly, that it undertakes to teach 
others, and yet, in all this long teaching, doth not 
once allude to the sufferings, resurrection, and spirit 
of Christ. He mentions Christ several times, yet 
teacheth nothing about him, but only speaks of faith 
in God generally. Now the function of a true apostle 
is to preach Christ's sufferings, resurrection, and 
office, and to lay the foundation of faith in the same. 
But this James enjoins only the law and works, and 
so confuses the one with the other, that it appears to 
me as if some good pious man had caught a few 
sayings from the disciples of the apostles, and had 



300 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

committed them to paper; or it is possibly written by 
another from his preaching. To sum up, he wishes 
to oppose those who rely on faith without works ; 
and proving too weak for his task, he attempts to 
enforce by the law what the apostles effect by the 
drawings of love. I cannot, therefore, place this 
epistle among the really chief books, but will prevent 
no one from j udging of it as he pleases, for many good 
texts are to be found therein. The epistle of Jude, 
as an extract or copy of the second epistle of Peter, 
need not be accounted one of the leading books. 
With respect to the Revelation of John, let every one 
follow his own opinion ; I state what I feel. For 
more than one reason, I cannot deem this book either 
apostolic or prophetic. First and foremost, the apos- 
tles do not report visions, but prophesy in plain 
simple words ; for it behoveth the apostolic function 
to speak of Christ and his works without figure or 
vision. No prophet of the Old Testament, to say 
nothing of the New, hath dealt so much in visions; 
so that I almost esteem it like the fourth book of 
Ezra, and can most assuredly find in it no trace of 
the Holy Spirit. Let every man entertain his own 
opinion with respect to it ; my mind cannot away 
with the book ; and it is sufficient reason for me not 
to esteem it highly, that Christ is neither taught nor 
known in it. Therefore I abide by the books which 
show me Christ clearly and purely." 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 301 

It will be evident to every one familiar with the 
subject, that we quote these passages merely as illus- 
trating Luther's individual sentiments, and by no 
means to favour a new authority in matters of faith 
based upon his word. Whoever seeks to obtain an 
independent and thorough comprehension of divine 
revelation in the Scripture will heartily adopt the 
profound words of Luther, that all the holy Scrip- 
tures interpret themselves by the connection and com- 
parison of separate passages and books, without look- 
ing to Rome. We attach, however, great importance 
to these expressions of the reformer, because they 
prove that the principle of Protestantism had even at 
that time occasionally reached in Luther's mind a 
point from which it timidly receded subsequently for 
several centuries, until the struggles and labours of 
more modern times rendered a return to it, and to the 
solution of the problem connected with it, imperative. 
These sentiments of Luther exhibit with equal dis- 
tinctness the individual and highly-coloured character 
of his religious life, and of his personal development 
and experience. But this individual standard will 
not always suffice rightly to estimate the manifold 
ways of God, which, from very different premises 
than his, conduct as certainly to truth and life. How- 
ever much our conception of individual points may 
differ from his, the decisive fact still remains in its 
full importance, that Luther, by asserting and main- 



302 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

taining the two great principles of the Reformation, 
— -justification by faith, and the authority of the holy 
Scriptures, — opened to the Christian spirit a new 
career of knowledge, development, and freedom for 
centuries to come. 

It was assuredly not in accordance with Luther's 
nature, to undertake, of his own choice and without 
the pressure of necessity, the systematic organisation 
of the new doctrine ; a task much better adapted to 
Melanchthon's character, who indeed took the first 
step towards it, until Calvin afterwards rendered the 
most effective service in this direction. Luther's 
greatness and power did not consist in rounding off a 
system, but rather in working out and contending for 
fundamental truths, in giving body to a principle 
conceived by him; he being ever essentially in- 
fluenced and determined by the warfare of antago- 
nistic principles. 

Many urgent motives combined at the earliest 
period of the Reformation, to render the embodying 
of the details of the new doctrine into a definite 
confession of faith absolutely necessary ; for at every 
public conference respecting these changes, the want 
of a clear and firm assertion of the newly-acquired 
position against the Romish church, as well as against 
extreme radical tendencies, made itself painfully per- 
ceptible. The first formal confession of the reformed 
faith was therefore, in essentials, the result of the 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



303 



immediately preceding struggle against Rome, against 
the political and religious revolution, and against the 
dissentient views respecting the sacrament of the 
Lord's supper. In this sense, the Augsburg Confession 
gave to the Reformation its provisional form in 
doctrinal matters. With this celebrated diet at 
Augsburg — thirteen years after Luther's theses had 
sounded the alarm — the great moment arrived when 
a number of German princes and towns professed 
publicly and solemnly, before emperor and people, the 
evangelical principles of the Reformation, and thereby 
declared their recognition by the law of the land. In 
the preceding year (April 9th, 1529) those who held 
the same religious opinions had formed themselves 
into the "Protestant party" at the diet at Spires by 
their "protestation" against the conclusions of the 
Catholic majority. In that collective protestation we 
hear a noble echo of the individual protestation of a 
single conscience, which Luther alone had made at 
Worms (1521). As, however, that protestation pro- 
ceeded only from a minority of the German states at 
the diet, the hope (which Luther entertained as late 
as 1522) that the Reformation would become the 
cause of all Germany, had vanished, and the separa- 
tion of the German nation at its religious root was all 
but decided. 

As in the doctrine, so in the worship and constitu- 
tion of the new church, Luther proceeded slowly, 



304 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

step by step, as the necessity of the moment and the 
progress of the people permitted; in all cases he 
endeavoured to fall in with existing institutions, 
purifying and improving them, — rather to become the 
reformer of the ancient than the founder of an entirely 
new church. 

In the preface to Melanchthon's "Instruction for 
the Visitors to the Clergy in the Electorate of 
Saxony," he expressly stated, "that it was not in- 
tended by this to make new laws and decrees, but 
only a history and confession of our faith, until God 
the Holy Ghost give something better." He protects 
himself in the same manner, in the pamphlet, 
"German Mass and Order of Divine Service" (1526), 
most carefully from the suspicion that he wished to 
become the clerical legislator of Protestant Germany : 
" Above all things, I affectionately beseech those who 
observe or follow our order of public worship, not to 
consider it as an indispensable law, nor as a means to 
mislead or entrap the conscience of any one thereby, 
but to use it in Christian liberty, how, when, where, 
and how long it may be fit and required by circum- 
stances. It is not my opinion that all Germany 
should adopt our Wittenberg order." But he forgot 
in these regulations, which he yet described so 
unequivocally as preliminary and provisional, to 
specify how and by whom, and under what forms, 
future changes should be introduced. This omission 



REFORMATION I N GERMANY. 305 

was caused by the uncertain and unprepared attitude 
in which Luther stood to the whole question of church- 
government, for which indeed he felt no vocation. 
Impelled by the circumstances of the moment, he 
took provisional measures, which at a subsequent 
period were made, partially at least, absolute ; and 
left the new church eventually in a condition rather 
resembling the scaffolding made for the erection of a 
building than the edifice itself. 

True to the spiritual character of his religious 
sentiments, he regarded the externals of religion, all j 
that relates to worship and the constitution of the 
church, not as a vital question, but as a matter of 
education and progressive culture, to bring those as 
yet spiritual babes, who were still in bondage, to 
spiritual maturity and freedom. " Since there is 
nothing in these external ordinances that concerns our 
conscience before God, and they may yet be useful 
to our neighbour, we ought to consider them in the 
spirit of love, to cause us all to be of one mind, to 
act in the same manner; even as all Christians have 
one baptism, one sacrament, and to none is any 
special one given by God. To sum up, we do not 
establish these forms for the sake of those who are 
already Christians, — they do not need any of these 
things, they worship God in the spirit; but for the 
sake of those such ordinances are necessary, who are 
vet to become Christians, or strengthened in the 
20 



306 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

faith : just as a Christian needs not baptism, the word, 
and the sacrament, as a Christian (for he has all 
things already,) but as a sinner. Above all, these 
ordinances are necessary for the ignorant and the 
young, who ought to and must be brought up and 
exercised daily in the Scriptures. For their sake we 
must read, sing, pray, preach, write, and compose 
hymns; and if it would tend to their good, I 
would gladly have all the bells ring, all the organs 
pipe, and everything else make music that can. It is 
f in this that popish worship is so objectionable, that a 

work and a merit is made of it, instead of its being 
employed for the instruction of the young and igno- 
rant by exercising them in the Scriptures and the 
word of God. 

As he distinguished here so plainly between those 
who were already Christians, and others who were to 
become so, he arrived necessarily at the conclusion, 
that different forms of divine service are required, 
besides the general form, for these different degrees 
of Christian knowledge, because those far advanced 
and matured in faith and knowledge might put forth 
their claim for the due supply of their spiritual wants 
in the worship and constitution of the church. 
Indeed, he enters upon the consideration of this 
subject without any reserve, and thus recognises a 
pressing and spiritual claim which has scarcely ever, 
and at no time satisfactorily, been met by the Protes- 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



307 



tant churches, and which, for that reason, has often 
asserted its right in a morbid, extravagant, and fan- 
tastic manner. Luther accordingly introduces three 
different grades of divine service ; first, the Latin mass 
(purified in the spirit of the Gospel,) the frequent 
use of which he desired to retain especially for the 
sake of the young : " For I by no means wish to 
dispense with the use of the Latin language in divine 
service. I do not agree with those who confine them- 
selves to one language ; for I am anxious to educate 
such youths and adults who may be useful to Christ 
in foreign countries also, and converse with the 
people." The second form of worship proposed by 
him is the German mass, a for the sake of the igno- 
rant laity." Both modes of worship, the Latin and 
the German mass, are to suit the requirements of a 
national church, or a church for the people, as a 
"public attraction to Christian faith" for those great 
miscellaneous assemblies, " among whom there are 
many who do not yet believe, nor are Christians, but 
most of them stand by and gape for something new, 
as if we were celebrating divine worship in the open 
air among Turks or infidels." From these modes of 
worship he distinguished, in the most marked 
manner, Ci the third hind, which is the true manner of 
evangelical ordinances" under which class he compre- 
hended, if we may so speak, the intimate communion 
of the esoteric church, the evangelical priesthood of 



SOS 



M A R T I N 



LUTHER. A X D THE 



all true Christians, mature in faith and love, which 
was intended to take the place of the hierarchy of 
the Romish priesthood. The special worship of this 
more exclusive religious communion (Spener's eccle- 
siola in ecelesia) should, in Luther's opinion. " not 
take place so publicly among all sorts of people; but 
those who are serious Christians, and ready to confess 
the gospel with hand and mouth, should inscribe their 
names and assemble together in some private house 
for prayer, reading, and baptism, to receive the sacra- 
ment, and perform other Christian works." Within 
this circle he advised the introduction of a church- 
discipline and care of the poor : i; Here baptism and 
the sacrament might be dealt with briefly but decor- 
ousby. and attention be devoted principally to the 
word, to prayer, and to labours of love." 

This was. alas, but an idea thrown in the lap of 
time ; he did not consider those more immediately 
around him. his German contemporaries as a whole, 
sufficiently prepared for such a measure : " I can and 
may not yet establish and regulate such a community 
or assembly, for I have not yet the necessary persons, 
nor do I see that many desire it :" therefore he would 
confine himself to the two first grades of divine 
service, in addition to preaching, until he could with 
a good conscience introduce also the third order, 
when, on some future day. true and earnest Chris- 
tians might unite for that object and require it of 



REFORMATION" IN GERMANY. 309 

him. If he were not to wait for that time, but seek 
to carry out his project by himself, he feared that it 
might lead to " disturbances (rebellion, schism, and 
sectarianism ;) for we Germans are a rude, mad, and 
crazy folk, with whom it is not easy to undertake any 
thing, unless strict necessity drive us to it." 

The lingering effects of his previous contests with 
the " enthusiastic and rebellious spirits," L e. the radi- 
cals and fanatics, had evidently diminished his earlier 
confidence of success and reliance on the genius of 
his nation ; so that he wanted courage to complete 
the evangelical church in her more noble organism, 
presuming (which is doubtful) that he was not origi- 
nally deficient in the gifts necessary for this work of 
organisation. It was doubtless also this same state 
of mind which aroused in Luther — as opposing the 
progress of radicalism — a feeling of closer relationship 
to the old Christian elements of the Roman Catholic 
church, in consequence of which he brought forward, 
more prominently than heretofore, principles common 
to the Catholic and to the evangelical church. He 
says, for instance, in his treatise on Anabaptism 
(Wiedertanfe, Feb. 1528,) in refutation of those who 
would not admit infant baptism because the pope 
did : " If so, they must deny also the holy Scriptures 
and preaching, for all this we have in common with 
the pope ; we must also give up the Old Testament, 
that we may take nothing from the unbelieving Jews 



310 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

either. We admit that there is much Christian good 
in the papacy, nay all Christian good, and hath from 
thence come to us : namely, we acknowledge that in 
the papacy is found the true holy Scripture, the true 
baptism, the true sacrament [Sacrament des Altars,) 
the true key to the forgiveness of sins, true preaching 
of the Gospel, the true catechism. I say unto you, 
that true Christendom is under the pope, yea the 
quintessence of Christendom, and many great pious 
saints. If Christendom be under the pope, then it 
must truly be the body and member of Christ ; if it 
is his body, it must have the true spirit, Gospel, faith, 
baptism, sacrament, key, preaching, prayer, holy Scrip- 
ture, and all that Christendom should have. We do 
not rant like the fanatics, and reject all connected 
with the pope; else we should also reject Christen- 
dom, the temple of God, and all that is derived from 
Christ. On the contrary, we fight against and reject 
this, that the pope will not suffer Christendom to rest 
contented with such good, inherited from the apostles, 
but will join his devilish additions thereto; and doth 
not use such good for the advantage of God's temple, 
but for its destruction, compelling men to value his 
commands and ordinances more than Christ's. 
Beloved, it behoveth us not so fiercely to rail against 
the pope, because the saints of Christ are subject to 
him : a cautious and modest spirit is needed, leaving 
to him what belongs to God's temple, and to guard 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



311 



against his additions by which he destroys the temple 
of God." 

In these moderate expressions we no longer recog- 
nise the wrath of the Elias of 1520, but the sobriety 
of the Keformer, matured and tried by the storms of 
time. And ought we not to look upon such expres- 
sions as a consolatory prophecy of a time to come, in 
which bitter strife, and the blind and persecuting 
spirit of party, between the living members of the 
divided Christian church, w T ill be appeased, so that 
due honour may be given to the religion of the 
Eedeemer by a more elevated union in the eternal 
principles of truth? 



The attentive reader will be enabled to form a 
tolerably correct idea, from the above account of the 
personal character of the great reformer, without our 
describing his peculiarities more in detail. His 
spiritual development, his public career, his words 
and deeds, are the most decided and indelible traits 
in the portraiture of Luther's character. We confine 
ourselves, therefore, in our remaining observations, to 
supplementary suggestions, for the purpose of giving 
the reader a more complete impression of his charac- 
ter in one or two distinct aspects. 

We review with astonishment and admiration the 
range of his indefatigable activity, the extraordinary 



312 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

degree of his influence as teacher, priest, and head of 
his church. 

It is but seldom that a man becomes, in so compre- 
hensive and sublime a sense as Luther, the teacher 
of his nation. By means of a translation unequalled 
in its kind, and an oral and written exposition full of 
intelligence and power, breathing the noblest and 
most profound nationality, he brought the book most 
essential to the religious culture of man nearer to the 
understanding and the heart of his nation ; the 
meanest of the people were thus enabled to draw the 
richest nourishment for heart and mind directly from 
the ancient written sources of our religion. The merit 
of this service alone places him among the greatest 
benefactors of his race. And how creative and heart- 
felt his eloquence, remarkable both for childlike purity 
and manly courage! If it is true that the spiritual 
individuality of man is revealed in his style, what a 
brilliant light do Luther's writings shed upon him ! 
One of the greatest judges of the German language 
speaks of him thus : " Luther's language must be 
considered, both on account of its noble and almost 
miraculous purity and its great impressiveness, as the 
germ and foundation of modern high-German diction, 
but slightly departed from even in our day, and then, 
in most cases, to the loss of its expressive power. 
The modern high-German (rieu hochdeutsch) may, in 
fact, be termed the dialect of Protestantism ; and the 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



313 



spirit of freedom which it breathes has long since, 
unknown to themselves, captivated the writers and 

poets of the Catholic faith We are indebted to 

Luther more than to any one, for reviving and fostering 
the body and spirit of our language, and even for the 
beauties of modern German poetry." 

And we find the same man whom we admire as 
the translator, expounder, and preacher of God's 
Word, giving the tone as the spiritual poet of the 
Eeformation, and by his hymns becoming the origi- 
nator of that beautiful blossom of German Protestan- 
tism, psalmody. It is impossible to speak of his 
merit with reference to German psalmody without 
making mention of his exquisite hymn of triumph, 
which he most likely composed in the year of the pro- 
testation at Spires (1529). Wherever an attempt 
is made to represent and to appreciate Luther, this 
noble poem, in which his heroic spirit unintentionally 
shines forth in inimitable and ideal grandeur, must 
find a place. 

Sutter's Hgmtt* 

din fefter 23ttrg tft anfer ©ott, 
din gute 3Bef)r unb 5Baffen; 
Gr fytlft mtg fret auS alter ^otfy, 
2)te unS je£t fyat betrojfem 
£)er alte bofe getnb 
SDHt (£rnft je£t memt, 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

©rog 3)iad)t »nt> Diet 2tft 
<5etn graufam D^ufhtng tjt; 
2luf @rb'n tfi nicfjt fem'S ©fetcfyen* 

IDHt unfrer 9DJacf)t md)t3 getfyan, 
2Bir ftnb gar balb tterloren; 
(5$ firett't fur un£ ber recite SDtamt, 
£>en ©ott felbft fyat erforen, 
gragjt bu roer ber tfi? 
<5r Jjeigt 3efu3 §f)rtjt, 
£er £erre 3 e ^ at >^/ 
Unb tji fern anbrer ©ott; 
£>ad gelb mug er fcefjalten. 

Unb roenn bte 2BeIt i>oll £eufel todr, 
Unb rooUt'n unS gar fcerfcfyltngen, 
©o fitrcfyten n>tr ung tttcf>t fo fefyr; 

mug un£ bod) geltngen. 
£er gitrfte btefer SOBelr, 
5Bte fau'r er ffcf) fieUr, 
£bat er un$ bocf) ntcfytS, 
£>a3 macf)t, er tjt gertcfrt't, 
din 2B5rtletn faun tint fatten. 

£a3 5Bort ffc fatten lafiett ftafjtt, 
Unb fetn'n £anf ba$u fyaben; 
@r tjt bet unS n>ol)l auf bem spian, 
9J?tt fetnem ©eijt unb ©aben. 
Sftefymen fte ung ben £etb, 
©ut, <£\)v, £tnb unb SBetb, 
2ag fabren bat)tn ! 
8te fyaben'S fetn ©eromn ; 
£>aS fftetcfj mug un$ bocf) bletben. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



TRANSLATION. 

Our God is a strong tower, 

A sure defence and weapon; 
He aids in every hour, 

Whate'er distress may happen. 
The old and evil foe 
Striveth to bring us low, 

Great in his craft and might, 
Full armed for the fight; 
On earth none can him liken. 

Our feeble might achieveth nought, 

"We soon are lost and undone; 
By Him alone the work is wrought 
Whom God himself hath chosen. 
Dost thou ask the name? 
Christ Jesus is the same, 
The Lord of Sabaoth : 
There is no other God; 
'Tis He the field hath taken. 

And were the world of devils full, 

All threatening to devour us, 
We fear not; true and dutiful, 

They cannot overpower us. 
Prince of this world in vain 
Hound us his darts may rain, 
He no harm can do; 
His arts must perish too; 
A little word can slay him. 



316 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

That Word of his shall sure remain, 

And still no thanks be theirs; 
He's with us on the battle-plain, 

His spirit and his gifts are ours. 
Perish our poor estate, 
Wife — children — by their hate, 
On them be the sin; 
Nought from us can they win, 
His kingdom must be ours ! 

We have styled him above the teacher of his 
nation ; and this name is also singularly applicable to 
his unwearied efforts in word and deed for the religious 
and scientific culture of the young; his Little and 
Great Catechism became the guide of millions to the 
knowledge of the principles of Christianity. He 
readily seized every opportunity of appealing to the 
hearts and consciences of the nation for the foundation 
of new, and the maintaining and extending of 
existing schools. Thus in his " Address to his Burgo- 
masters and Councillors of all German Cities to 
establish and uphold Christian Schools" (1524), and 
in the sermon " On the Duty of Sending Children to 
School" (1530), he says: "If we wish to give the 
devil a blow and to hit him very hard, we must do it 
through the young people brought up in the know- 
ledge of God to spread abroad his word One 

true Christian is better, and can do more good, than 
all men on earth can do harm. And for what other 



REFORMATION IN" GERMANY. 317 

reason do we old people live, but to minister to and 
bring up the young ? God hath intrusted them to us, 
and will call us to a strict account concerning them. 
Children are born daily, and grow up among us, and 
there is, alas, no one who takes their part and directs 
them; we let things take their own course. The 
monasteries and foundations ought to do it ; but these 
are they of whom Christ says : 6 Woe unto the world 
because of offences !'.... Therefore it behoveth the 
council and the authorities to bestow the greatest 
care and attention upon the young: for it is the 
chief prosperity, glory, and power of a city, to possess 
many learned, sensible, honourable, w T ell-educated 
citizens, who may afterwards be able to gather wealth 
and make good use of it. 

" And let us not forget that we shall not be able to 
preserve the Gospel without the (dead) languages. 
Languages are the scabbard of the sword of the 
Spirit; they are the caskets in which we bear this 
treasure. For as the Gospel hath come alone through 
the Holy Ghost and still cometh, yet it came 
through the medium of the languages, and must be 
retained thereby. Soon after the apostolic age, when 
the languages ceased, the Gospel, faith, and Christi- 
anity fell away more and more, until they wholly 
vanished under the popes. Now, when languages 
have revived, they bring such light with them, that 
all the world must admit we have the Gospel as pure 



318 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



and entire as the apostles, and, indeed, in greater 
purity than in the days of Jerome and Augustine. . . 
For the fathers themselves are often at fault; and 
because they were ignorant of the languages, they 

seldom agree St. Bernard was a man of so 

powerful a mind, that I can almost place him above 
all other teachers; but behold how often he trifles 
with the Scriptures (spiritually) and misinterprets 
them! Since it behoveth Christians to be skilled in 
the holy Scriptures, their special and only book, it is 
a sin and shame not to know the word of our God, 
and a still greater sin and shame not to learn the 
languages ; since God hath given us both people and 

books, and desireth his books to be open to all 

Let us not be confounded if a few boast of the spirit, 

and disparage the Scripture Spirit here or spirit 

there ! I have also been in the spirit, and have also 
seen spirits. But this I know well, how little the 
spirit doth all alone. I should have been far enough 
astray, had not the languages helped me, and made 
me sure and safe respecting the Scriptures. I might 
have been, indeed, pious, and preached in quiet, but 
must have let the pope and the sophists, and the 
whole rabble of Antichrist, remain what they were. 
The Scriptures and the languages make the world too 
hot to hold the devil. 

" And even if there were no soul, no heaven or 
hell, and schools and languages were not wanted for 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



319 



the knowledge of God and of the Scriptures, this would 
be still a sufficient reason for establishing schools for 
boys and girls in every place, that the world needs 
clever men and women for its temporal well-being. 
As far as I am concerned (1524), if I had any 
children, I would have them study not only languages 
and histories (Geschichten) , but also music and the 
whole science of mathematics. How much do I now 
regret that I have not read more poets and histories, 
and instead have been compelled to read that devil's 
filth, the philosophers and sophists, with great toil, 
expense, and damage ! I have since had enough to do 
to get rid of it. And if I were obliged to resign my 
post as preacher (1530), I should prefer no office 
before that of schoolmaster or teacher of boys ; for I 
know that after preaching, this work is the most 
useful and the greatest and best. Beloved, we must 
regard it as the greatest virtue on earth, to educate 
other people's children, which few do by their own." 

Luther was not only the teacher of his nation, but 
he had at the same time the true nature of a priest; 
for he loved his people with holy earnestness, and he 
often wrestled near unto death to obtain an assurance 
of the validity of his vocation. Already inclined to 
the melancholy which is common in thoughtful and 
poetic natures, by education and bodily and mental 
peculiarities, his position exposed him to inward and 
outward conflicts, to frequent wrestling with the most 



320 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



oppressive states of mind, which at times rose to the 
highest degree of bodily and mental anguish. We 
have an account of one of these attacks of spiritual 
distress, from the pen of his friends Bugenhagen and 
Justus Jonas, as recent as 1527 : " On Saturday, the 
9 th of July, our beloved father, Martin Luther, had 
one of those dreadful attacks, the like of which we 
read of in the Psalms. He has indeed often before 
experienced such conflicts, but never such a violent 
one as this ; as he admitted on the following day, that 
it had been much more severe and dangerous than the 
bodily weakness which seized him on the evening of 
the same day. As soon as this spiritual temptation 
was over, the pious Job, fearing that if the hand of 
God should fall upon him again so severely, he would 
not be able to endure it, sent his servant Wolf, de- 
siring me to come to him with all speed. When we 
went up to him, and retired into a private place, he 
commended himself and all he had with great 
earnestness to God, began to confess and acknowledge 
his sins ; and the master sought consolation from his 
disciple out of God's Word, i. e. absolution and re- 
mission of sins, and besought me to pray for him 
diligently. He further requested that I would allow 
him to receive the holy sacrament of the body and 
blood of Christ on the following Sunday, for he hoped 
to preach on that day. . . . When he had confessed 
and spoken of the spiritual assault he had borne that 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



321 



morning, with such fear and trembling that he could 
scarcely describe it, he continued, ' Many think, 
because I sometimes appear cheerful in my walk and 
conversation, that my path is strewn with roses ; but 
God knoweth how it is with me in regard to life. I 
have often intended, for the sake of the world, to 
appear (that is to say, act) somewhat more serious 
and holy ; but God hath not given me the power to do 
so. The world can find — I thank God for it — no vice 
in me, nevertheless it taketh offence at me.' " On the 
evening of the same day, when a violent fit of illness 
followed the mental anguish of the morning, he made 
a formal confession, in the presence of his friends 
Bugenhagen and Jonas, to the effect, that the oppres- 
sion of spirit which had overtaken him that morning 
did no ways arise from any doubt of the truth of his 
doctrine : " As the world taketh delight in lying, 
many will say that I recanted my doctrine at the 
last. I therefore earnestly beseech you to witness my 
confession of faith. I say with a good conscience^ 
that I have taught God's Word faithfully as he hath 
commanded, and to which I was drawn and compelled 
without any will of my own. Yea, I have truly and 
savingly taught faith, love, the cross, the sacraments, 
and other articles of Christian doctrine. Many accuse 
me of being too severe and violent in writing against 
the papists and rebels (Rotten geister). Yes, I have 
indeed hit my enemies hard, but I have never repented 
21 



322 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

of it; whether violent or moderate, I have never 
sought to injure any one, still less ruin his soul, but 
have rather sought the advantage and salvatiou of my 
foes." 

One of the principal sources of the discontent and 
dejection which overpowered him in the later years 
of his life, more and more frequently, is certainly to 
be sought in the fact, that the Reformation had not 
produced all the moral fruit he expected from it. 

It was a grievous disappointment, which kept 
festering like an open wound through all the later 
years of his life, that all those whom he had liberated 
from the Romish yoke, by proclaiming the liberty of 
the Gospel, had not proved themselves worthy of 
that liberation by the purity of their conversation 
and conduct, and by deeds of love ; that many, on the 
contrary, had dishonoured the liberty obtained at so 
great a sacrifice, by hardened indifference and the 
coarsest licentiousness. This experience drew from 
him the bitterest expressions, a few of which only we 
will quote. "Sodom a?id Gomorrah" he wrote in 
1530, "were never one-tenth part so wicked as Germany 
is now, for they had not God's Word and preaching. 
We, on the contrary, have it in vain; and we act 
as if we wished that God and his Word, that decency 
and honour, should perish. If such things are to be 
done in German lands, woe is me that I was born in 
Germany, or ever learnt, spoke, and wrote German. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 323 

And if I could do it according to my conscience, I 
would rather advise and assist to bring back the rule 
of the pope and all his enormities. Formerly all 
purses were open, and there were no bounds to giving ; 
but now, when we want to establish or maintain 
proper schools and churches, all your purses have 
padlocks. I pray God for a happy death, that I may 
not see all the misery that must come upon Germany. 
For I hold, that if ten Moses were to arise and inter- 
cede for us, they could not prevail ; I myself feel also, 
when I wish to pray for my dear Germany, that my 
prayer recoils on me, and will not ascend as it is 
wont to do when I pray for other things." At a 
later period he states in his ToMe-tallc : " It is a 
strange and very grievous thing, that the world hath 
become worse and worse since the revival of the true 
doctrine of the Gospel, by the special grace and 
revelation of God. Every one perverts Christian 
liberty into carnal wantonness ; therefore is the reign 
of the devil and the pope, as far as external rule is 
concerned, the best for the world, for with such only 
will it be ruled with severe laws and justice, and with 
superstition. The doctrine of the grace of God 
maketh it worse. Alas, the world remaineth the 
world! If our Lord Christ hath not been able to 
amend it, neither shall we, and must therefore let it 
go its own gait to the devil." 

And yet this man, whom we have accompanied 



324 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

through successive and most severe mental sufferings, 
caused by conflicts, doubts, and fears, could at other 
times effectually strengthen timorous souls ; and with 
the deeply impressive confidence of the hero, and the 
touching simplicity of a child, uphold the faith in the 
sanctity and indestructible nature of his cause, 
even when all around him became discouraged. He 
wrote, during the sitting of the diet at Augsburg, to 
his friend the Chancellor Bruck, from the castle of 
Coburg (where he intended to erect three tabernacles 
by his works — one for the Psalter, one for the 
Prophets, and one for Esop) : " I have recently seen 
two strange things : the first, when I looked from my 
window, I saw the stars and the beautiful dome of 
God, and saw no pillars on which the builder had 
placed the arch ; yet the heavens fell not, and the 
arch still standeth. Now there are some who seek for 
such pillars, who would like to touch and seize them ; 
but because they cannot do that, they flutter and 
tremble, as if the heaven would certainly fall ; if they 
could grasp the pillars, the heaven would stand firm. 
The second strange thing : I saw great heavy clouds 
sweep over us in such masses that they could be com- 
pared to a great sea ; yet I saw no support on which 
they could rest or find footing; still they fell not upon 
us, but greeted us with a gloomy aspect, and sped on. 
"When they had passed, the rainbow shone forth, — 
that was but a weak support, a mere reflection or 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 325 

shade. Nevertheless it proved in reality that it bore 
the vapoury burden and protected us." 

As through the power of his faith, so also by the 
tenderness and magnanimity of his love did he 
exhibit the spirit of a true evangelical priest, which 
most beautifully proves its vocation by devoting itself 
to the service of others. In this sense especially — as 
a compassionate feeling for the distress of others, as a 
ministry ready for every act of sacrifice, in imitation 
of Him who gave himself a sacrifice for us — did he 
practise love in noble self-denial, esteeming it the 
highest gem of spiritual Christianity. How deeply 
was he grieved to find the active proofs of the divine 
spirit so rare among those who nevertheless called 
themselves Christians : " That is indeed true," he 
exclaims (1522) to his people at Wittenberg; "ye 
have the true Gospel and the pure Word of God, yet 

no one giveth his goods to the poor Ye are ivil- 

ling to receive all the good gifts of God in t/ie sacrament, 
but are unwilling to pour them fourth again in love. 
No one loill stretch forth his hand to another • no one 
heartily talceth the part of another ; but every one 
thinketh only of himself, what is of advantage to 
him, and seeketh his own. No one looketh to the 
poor, to help them. Oh, pitiable case ! . . . . And if 
ye be not willing to love one another, God will send a 
great plague upon you ; for he toill not suffer his Word 
io be revealed and preached in vain." 



326 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

Do we not find in these impressive words of the 
head of German Protestantism those highest require- 
ments of Christianity already indicated, which we 
are beginning in our days to comprise under the ex- 
pression spiritual mission (innere Mission) ? And 
have we not also here expressed, in the simplest 
words, that moving truth which, though often and 
long despised, makes itself suddenly heard and felt 
at particular times in overwhelming judgments (as ? 
for instance, in the convulsions of the last few years,) 
— that truth, that whenever we set at naught the 
laws of love for any length of time, the laws of wrath 
will inevitably overtake us sooner or later; because 
the entire moral constitution of the viorld has been found- 
ed by its sacred Author on righteousness and love; and 
all presumptuous attempts to disarrange it must finally 
lead, as insane opposition to the divine will, to self- 
annihilation ? 

Luther himself practised in the highest degree that 
quality in which he found others so frequently 
deficient : his affecting readiness to give all he had, 
and rather deny himself than see others want, is one 
of the most amiable features in his character, and 
placed him on a par with the noblest Christians of 
later times, such as Spener, Frank, and Lavater. 
Slight indeed was the charm of worldly possession 
and enjoyment for his great mind. "Well might he 
use the sublime expressions with regard to himself: 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 327 

"If my own heart did not drive me to work for the sake 
of the Man who died for me, the toorld could, not offer me 
money enough for writing a book, or interpreting any 
portion of the Bible. The toorld shall not reward my 
work ; the world is too mean and poor to do it. And 
he who thought so little of making a provision for 
himself, that he gave every thing to the needy, even 
the money his wife received from her god-mother, 
habitually refused the rich presents of his prince, and 
was never weary of begging for others, could reconcile 
himself gladly to the probability of being obliged to 
earn his bread by the work of his hands, and on that 
account began to practice the crafts of the turner and 
gardener. 

His importance as preacher and priest was init- 
mately connected with the position he occupied — in 
fact, if not in name — as head of the church (Kirchen- 
fiirst). A glance at his correspondence will best 
show his extraordinary activity as the adviser of 
numerous individuals, communities, and countries; 
nothing important, more particularly if it referred to 
the schools or the church, was for a long course of 
years undertaken without his counsel. The Electors 
John and John-Frederick, with many distinguished 
men of their immediate connexion, highly respected 
Luther's authority in all matters of conscience ; while 
he, on his side, availed himself principally of their 
help in establishing the new order of things. The 



328 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

important position he assigned to the ruling princes 
in the new church, as well as to the authorities gener- 
ally (that is, in modern phrase, to the state,) had a 
reflective political influence beyond all calculation on 
succeeding centuries : the tendency to the develop- 
ment of absolute sovereign power was greatly 
increased by the peculiar genius of Luther's Protes- 
tantism. He insisted on the obedience of the Chris- 
tian subject even towards tyrannical and unjust 
rulers ; but should any disputes arise between a king 
and his parliament concerning established laws, he 
decided that another authority should interpose and 
arbitrate. He condemned, without reserve, all 
violent attempts on the part of subjects to right 
themselves. He terms insurrection the worst crime, 
and the murder of tyrants the watchword of anarchy : 
" Whenever the destruction of tyrants is sanctioned, 
general license ensues, and soon reaches such a 
height, that those are branded as tyrants who are not 
tyrants, and are put to death just as the mob takes it 
into its own head. If we are to suffer injustice, let it 
be rather by the hands of the authorities; for th * 
mob knows no moderation, and every single man 
amongst them is as bad as five tyrants." 

Although he lays so much emphasis on the inviola- 
bility of the supreme power, yet innumerable 
passages in his works prove how meanly he thought 
of the majority of the princes of his time. He calls 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



329 



Duke George of Saxony a "fury, a miserable mad- 
man, a restless destructive tool of Satan. He once 
wrote to Spalatin with reference to King Christian of 
Denmark : " It may chance that God will admit some 
time or another your dainty game (Wildpret,) that is 
to say, a king and queen, to heaven." The strongest 
expressions are found, as is well known, in his contro- 
versial writings against Henry VIII. of England, 
whom he styles " Henry, king not by God's grace. I 
care not whether King Hal or King Dick, devil, or 
hell itself made the book : whoever tells a lie is a liar; 
therefore I don't fear him (this lying king). Indeed, 
my young squire, say what you please, but you shall 
also hear what won't please you; I will cure your 
itching for lies ! So much are your great lords accus- 
tomed to flattering and feigning, that they pretend it 
is all up with the Christian faith if we tell them the 
truth, and sprinkle salt on their nasty, festering 
wounds. King Hal bears out the proverb, ' No fools 
like kings and princes.' If any king or prince 
imagines that Luther will humble himself before him, 
repent of his doctrine, and seek for pardon, he is 
grossly deceived, and indulges in a golden dream. . . . 
As far as my doctrine is concerned, I deem no one 

great ; but I treat him as a bubble, or even less 

But where my person and life are concerned, I am 
ready to humble myself before any one, even before a 
child. Where my doctrine and ministry are con- 



330 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

cerned, let no one expect patience or humility from 
me ; least of all, your tyrants and persecutors of the 
Gospel." 

He did not regard the strong language he employed 
with reference to these princes as inconsistent with 
his doctrine of unconditional obedience. In fact, he 
only repudiated violent resistance to the authorities, 
and considered moral resistance to all abuses of abso- 
lute power perfectly justifiable; and, as Christian 
censor, fearlessly practised it, in the name of morality, 
and on the authority of the Word of God. For himself 
he claimed on this score the greatest latitude of pen 
and tongue. With reference to the internal - govern- 
ment of the new church, he drew a clear distinction 
between freedom of faith and freedom of teaching : no 
one compelled to faith; but no public teacher could 
be allowed to teach any doctrine differing from the 
fundamental articles of faith based on the Scriptures, 
or from the recognized doctrines of the church : "they 
are not to be tolerated, but punished as public blas- 
phemers." Even he, therefore, could propose no 
better solution to this most difficult of all problems in 
the constitution of state-churches. When two reli- 
gious parties contended in the state, he gave to the 
civil authorities the power of deciding which of the 
two taught in accordance with the Scriptures ; — the 
first step towards the establishment of political, after 
the overthrow of Romish, popery ! 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



331 



The most painful moments which his position as 
spiritual adviser to the Protestant princes inflicted 
upon him, were occasioned, no doubt, by the notorious 
second marriage which the Landgrave Philip of Hesse 
contracted during the lifetime of his first wife. 
Never did he feel so much pain in giving counsel as 
when forced by this prince to advise with him on this 
occasion. It threw the more gentle Melanchthon 
upon a sick-bed, and brought him to the brink of the 
grave. We know not what Luther felt at that time ; 
how severity and gentleness, how repugnance to the 
act and indulgent consideration of the peculiarities of 
the case, contended within him. But it is certain 
that Calvin would have acted otherwise ; and also 
that Luther's character would stand higher if in this 
matter he had looked neither to the right nor left, but 
remained true to his moral feelings and principles; 
obeying God rather than man. 

He was far better fitted, by his whole gifts and 
character, to be the pioneer and the hero of the 
decisive spiritual battles, than the leader and lawgiver, 
or the ruling and organising head, of German Protes- 
tantism. His virtues and his defects had sprung 
from the deepest inward and the most violent outward 
struggles. His world-wide influence lies in contest ; 
but in contest also we detect his vulnerable part. An 
irascible disposition such as his could scarcely ever, in 
cases of great excitement, express itself in words. 



332 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

without so yielding to the impulse of the moment as 
to overstep the line within which a sober and well- 
balanced mind would, in peaceable times, confine 
itself. Every reader will readily apply this observa- 
tion to Luther's polemical writings, which seldom 
exhibit the moderation sought for in him by a purer 
judgment in a less disturbed period. It is true that 
the tone and manner of his time, and not unfrequently 
also the irritating and immoderate language of his 
antagonists, must necessarily excuse and extenuate 
much that now offends us in his language. Neverthe- 
less, we cannot, without puerile and cowardly 
sophistry, deny the simple fact, that the real defect 
in his character is an immoderate violence and a 
natural spirit of defiance, carried to excess by opposi- 
tion, frequently presenting unbearable asperities to 
friend and foe. Both these peculiarities of his natural 
disposition were rather fostered than subdued by his 
education and earlier connexions ; at a later period, 
when his hitherto slumbering genius woke up to a 
sense of his vocation, and accomplished the religious 
emancipation of his country, these more objectionable 
features of his character remained blended in a 
thousand ways with his greatest and noblest qualities. 
The Luther of history cannot be represented, in his 
character and influence, without this mixture of the 
impure and earthly with the pure and divine. 
Possibly the strength and the weakness, the lights 



REFORMATION I N GERMANY. 333 

and shadows of his nature, are inseparable ; jet the 
historical and moral judgment must not be fettered 
nor silenced by such considerations. Why should we 
hide the fact, that there occur passages in his pole- 
mical writings against Henry VIII. which inspire not 
only repugnance, but disgust ? Why conceal, that in 
his controversy with his Catholic opponents, as well 
as with Zwingle and others, he exceeded the limits 
which a liberal education and Christian feeling 
impose? We would rather leave the question, 
"Whether the unhallowed schism between the Lutheran 
and Keformed churches — at one time near a friendly 
compromise (by means of the Wittenberg concordia, 
1536) — is to be laid to the charge of Luther's violence 
and pertinacity?" undiscussed and undecided, than 
nourish the controversial spirit on matters of faith 
which again rages so violently in our time. When 
will a more advanced stage of Christian knowledge 
and experience bring the unedifying wars of theolo- 
gians to their merited end ? Luther is not indebted 
to the controversy concerning the sacrament, however 
great its importance, for his title as the Keformer of 
Germany. 

luther's domestic lite and friendships. 

We experience an agreeable change when we regard 
Luther in his family and among his friends. We 
seem to pass from the close chamber into the open air 



334 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

of spring. From the Augustine cloister at Witten- 
berg, which had now become the residence of Luther 
and his family, sprang the noblest germ of social 
morality, and of the purest spirit of German domestic 
life. This cloister-home became the ideal type of 
numberless families of Protestant Germany, and 
especially of those numerous families of evangelical 
ministers (Priester) to whom German society is so 
largely indebted for morality and piety. The simple 
fact, that Luther, the former monk and Catholic priest, 
who as such had been excluded from the matrimonial 
tie by the twofold bonds of the hierarchical ordinances 
of Rome and the practice of centuries, ventured 
to become the founder of a family, was in itself most 
important. 

By this step he as decidedly opposed the Catholicism 
of the middle ages as by burning the papal bull. As 
long as celibacy was considered a high degree of 
holiness, and an indispensable condition of the priestly 
office, the religious and moral dignity of marriage and 
of domestic life was misunderstood and denied b}^ an 
exaggerated spiritualism ; which, as an ecclesiastical 
ordinance, was as much opposed to the divine law in 
nature as in the Scriptures. It is true Luther 
wavered here and there, in single expressions, between 
the purely realistic and the higher and ideal concep- 
tion of matrimony ; seeming at times to regard it only 
in the light of a law of nature, and again as the per- 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



335 



fection of moral life on earth ; but both these views 
were in the end blended into one and a much higher 
point of view (in the divine harmony of nature and 
grace) . At all events, Luther's act in this direction 
w T as much more important than his words ; for it pro- 
claimed to Germany and Europe that the man at the 
head of the Eeformation had discovered that Catholic 
monasticism and priesthood could not be reconciled to 
the moral and religious, principles of primitive Chris- 
tianity. Long previous to his own marriage he had 
maintained the nullity of monastic vows and the laws 
of clerical celibacy, from the authority of nature and 
of the Gospel ; for years past evangelical clergymen 
had married ; but it was very different when the 
spiritual head of the Reformntion, towards whom the 
eyes of all Europe were directed, set the seal to this 
primitive Christian idea by Ms example. He had 
steadily resisted several earlier attempts to persuade 
him to this step ; at length he suddenly resolved on 
taking it, at a time (June, 1525) when it was least 
expected. Immediately after the termination of the 
peasants' war, the consequences of which still seriously 
threatened the cause of the Reformation, he brought 
home his wife, Catherine von Bora, formerly a nun. 
A short time before, he had pressingly urged the 
Elector-Archbishop of Mayence to get married : " I do 
not understand how a man can remain without a 
wife, and not incur the wrath and displeasure of God ; 



336 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

and fearful would it be for him to be found without a 
wife in the hour of death. For what answer will he 
give when God asks him : 6 1 made thee a man, not 
to be alone, but to take a wife ; where is thy wife ?' " 
He then made the offer : " If my marriage would 
strengthen your grace's purpose, I would willingly set 
your grace the example." 

The joys and sorrows of his married state of one- 
and-twenty years have been frequently described in 
full. Our object, therefore (limited to a vivid and 
comprehensive sketch of this distinguished man), 
will be attained if we give a brief notice of him, in 
his own words, as a son, a husband, and a father. 

When he believed himself in great danger during 
the illness in 1527, to which we have alluded, he said 
to his wife : " My very dearest Kate, I pray thee, if 
our good God take me to him this time, be resigned to 
his merciful will. Thou art my wedded wife ; thou 
must be quite convinced of that, and have no doubt 
of it, let the blind, ungodly world say what it will. 
Do thou act according to God's Word, and hold fast 
by it, and thou shalt have a certain constant support 
against the devil and all his slanderous tongues." 
Afterwards he asked for his child : " Where is my 
very dearest Hanschen?" When it was brought to 
him, and it smiled upon its father, he said : " Oh, 
poor dear child ! Well, I commend my most dearly- 
beloved Kate, and thee, poor orphan, to my faithful 



REFORMATION I N GERMANY. 



337 



righteous God. Ye have nothing ; but God, who is a 
father of orphans and the judge of widows, will 
assuredly feed and take care of you." His wife, 
although much alarmed at these words, yet composed 
herself quickly, and said ; " My dearest doctor, if it 
be God's will, I shall be better pleased to know you 
are with Him than me ; but it doth not concern only 
me and my child, but many pious Christian people 
who yet have need of you. Do not grieve about me, 
my beloved master; I commend you to His divine 
will, and trust to God that he will graciously preserve 
you." 

His love for his parents is expressed most affect- 
ingly in two incomparable letters, which, although 
well known, may not here be omitted : 

" To my dear father, Hans Luther, citizen of Mans- 
feld in the valley, grace and peace in Christ Jesus 
our Lord and Saviour. Amen. 

" Dear Father, — My brother Jacob hath written to 
me that you are dangerously ill. As the air is un- 
healthy, and danger is everywhere, also on account 
of these evil times, I am anxious about you. For 
although God hath granted and preserved to you 
hitherto a strong and firm body, yet your age now 
causes me anxious thoughts. Still, none of us are 
secure of our life at any hour, nor ought to be ; for 
which reason I would have wished exceeding much 
to go to you in the body; but my friends have ad- 
22 



338 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

vised and persuaded me against it ; and I think my- 
self that I ought not to incur the danger and tempt 
Providence, — for you know how the lords and pea- 
sants favour me ! 

" But it would he a great joy to me, if you would 
consent to come hither with my mother; which my 
Kate also, and all of us, request with tears. I hope 
we shall take good care of you. Therefore I have 
sent Cyriacus to you, to ascertain whether your 
weakness will allow of it. For whichever the 
Divine Will may ordain concerning you, in this life or 
the next, I would most readily (as is my right) be 
about you in the body, and prove myself grateful to 
God and you, with filial love and duty, according to 
the fourth commandment. 

" In the meantime I pray with my whole heart to 
that Father who hath created and given you to me as 
a father, to strengthen you from His boundless good- 
ness, and enlighten and keep you with His spirit, that 
you may acknowledge with joy and thanks the blessed 
doctrine of His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, to which 
you are called and have come, from the past fearful 
darkness and error; and I hope that His mercy, 
which hath granted you such knowledge, and by it 
hath begun His work in you, may preserve and con- 
tinue it to the end, in the life to come, and in the 
happy future of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. 

" For He hath already sealed such doctrine and 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 339 

faith in you, and confirmed it by marks ; that is to 
sa y? y ou have suffered much abuse, disgrace, con- 
tempt, mockery, despite, hatred, enmity, and danger, 
for His name's sake, like the rest of us. (Gal. vi. 17). 
But these are the real marks, in which we must be 
foreknown; and like our Lord Christ, as St. Paul 
saith (Eom. viii. 29), that we may also be like unto 
his future glory. 

"Then keep your heart fresh and comforted in 
your weakness : for we have in a future life a sure 
and true helper with God, namely, Jesus Christ, who 
hath overcome death and sin for us, and sitteth there 
now looking for us with all the angels, and waiteth 
the moment of our departure home ; so that we need 
not be anxious, nor fear to sink and perish at last. 
His power over death and sin is too great for them to 
hurt us; so faithful and righteous is he, that he will 
not fail us, provided we put our trust in him. 

"For He hath spoken, promised, and affirmed it; 
He will not and cannot lie nor deceive — have no 
doubt on that head. 6 Ask/ He saith, 6 and it shall 
be given unto you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, 
and it shall be opened unto you' (Matt. vii. 7); and 
elsewhere (Acts ii. 21), 6 Whosoever shall call on the 
name of the Lord shall be saved.' And all the 
Psalms are full of comforting promise, the ninety-first 
Psalm especially, which is good to read for all sick 
people. 



340 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

" I have said this unto you in writing, being full of 
anxiety on account of your illness (because we know 
not the hour), that I may be a partaker of your faith, 
conflict, consolation, and thanks to God for His holy 
Word, which He hath in this our time granted us in 
so bountiful and gracious a way, for the strengthening 
of our soul. 

" But if it be His will that you shall be detained 
yet longer in this life, and share our sufferings in this 
sorrowful and sinful vale of tears, and witness much 
suffering, or bear your part, with all other Christians, 
in enduring and overcoming it, He will grant you 
grace to accept it all willingly and obediently. This 
life is nothing but a real vale of sorrow, in which we 
see and experience the more sin, wickedness, torment, 
and wretchedness, the longer we live. Neither will 
it cease nor lessen until we are laid in the ground : 
then indeed it must cease, and leave us to sleep in 
the peace of Christ, until He cometh and again 
awaketh us in blessedness. Amen. May He, our 
Lord and Saviour, be with you and by you, that we 
may (and I pray God it may be here or there) meet 
again in joy. For our faith is sure, and we do not 
doubt but we shall meet again ♦ shortly in Christ : 
since the departure from this life is of much less 
account before God than if I left Mansfeld and you 
to come hither, or you left me and Wittenberg to go 
to Mansfeld. Of this be assured, we shall but fall 
asleep, and all will be changed. 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 341 

" Although I hope that your pastors and preachers 
faithfully and abundantly minister unto you in this 
matter, so that you scarce need my prattling, yet I 
could not forbear trying to make up in this way for 
my absence from you in the body, in which, God 
knoweth, I grieve heartily. 

"My Kate, little Hans and Lena, and aunt Lena, 
and the whole household, greet you, and faithfully 
pray for you. I send greetings to my dear mother 
and all friends. The mercy and power of God be 
with you now and for ever! Amen. 

"Your loving son, 

"Martin Luther. 

" At Wittenberg, February, 15, 1530." 

In the following year, he wrote, under similar cir- 
cumstances, to his mother (May 20, 1531) : 

"Grace and peace in Christ Jesus our Lord and 
Saviour : Amen. 

" My Dearest Mother, — I have received the news 
of your illness from my brother Jacob : and I am 
much grieved for it, particularly as I cannot be with 
you in the body, as I fain would. Still, I appear 
bodily before you with this writing; and, with all 
our family, will not be absent from you in the spirit. 

"Although I hope that, without me, your heart 
hath long since been well disciplined, and that you 
well understand (thank God for it !) His comfortable 



342 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

Word ; and are provided with preachers and friends to 
comfort you, — yet will I do my part also, and, accor- 
ding to my duty, acknowledge you my mother, and 
myself your child, — for such the God and Creator 
of both hath made us, and assigned us duties towards 
each other, — that I also may increase the number of 
your comforters. 

" Firstly, my dear mother, you now know, by 
God's grace, that your illness is his fatherly and mer- 
ciful rod, and a very gentle rod compared with those 
which he applieth to the ungodly, nay, sometimes 
even to His own beloved children, of which one is 
beheaded, another burnt, a third drowned ; so that 
all of us may say, 6 For thy sake we are killed all the 
day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaugh- 
ter' (Psalm xliv. 23; Rom. viii. 36). Therefore 
should your illness neither grieve nor trouble you ; 
but be accepted with thanks, as sent by His mercy; 
seeing that it is but a slight suffering, even though it 
should end in death or dying, as compared with the 
sufferings of His own beloved Son, our Lord Jesus 
Christ, which He hath not suffered on His own 
account, as we suffer, but hath suffered for us and our 
sins. 

"Secondly, you also know, my dear mother, the 
great article and ground of your salvation, to which 
you are to look for comfort in this as in all other 
troubles — namely, the corner-stone, Jesus Christ 



REFORMATION IN GEE M A X Y . 343 

(Isaiah xxviii. 16; Rom. ix. 33; 1 Peter ii. 6), who 
will not waver nor desert us, and will not let us sink 
or be destroyed. For He is the Saviour, and is called 
the Saviour of all poor sinners (1 Tim. i. 15), and of 
all those who are in trouble and on the point of death, 
if they rely on Him and call upon His name. 

" He saith : ' Be comforted ; I have overcome the 
world.' If He hath overcome the world, He hath most 
assuredly overcome also the prince of this world, with 
all his might. And what else is his might but death, by 
which he hath made us subject unto him, and holds us 
captive for our sins' sake ? But now death and sin are 
overcome, we may, in joy and comfort, listen to the cheer- 
ing word: 'Be comforted; I have overcome the world.' 

"And we ought not to doubt that it is certainly 
true ; and not only so, but we are further commanded 
to receive such consolation with joy and thanksgiving. 
And those who will not be comforted by this word do 
injustice and the greatest dishonour to the blessed 
Comforter, as if it were not true that He bids us be 
of good cheer, or as if it were not true that He hath 
overcome the world ; so that we give our vanquished 
foes, the devil, sin, and death, strength to become 
tyrants, in opposition to our beloved Saviour ; — from 
which God preserve us ! 

" Therefore we may rejoice in all security and con- 
fidence ; and if any thought of sin or death affright 
us, we must raise our hearts and say: < See, my soul, 



344 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

what dost thou ? Dear death, dear sin, livest thou 
and affrightest nie ? Knowest thou not that thou art 
overcome? and that thou, death, art even dead? 
Knowest thou not One who saith of thee, 6 I have 
overcome the world ?' It is not fit for me to hear and 
give heed to thy threats, but to the consoling words 
of my Saviour; ' Be of good cheer, be of good cheer; 
I have overcome the world.' He is the conqueror, 
the true hero, who giveth and imputeth his victory to 
me in these words : 6 Be of good cheer.' To Him I 
cleave ; on His word and comforting I rely : withersoever 
I go, He will not deceive me. Thou wouldst gladly 
deceive me by thy false terrors, and separate me from 
this Conqueror and Saviour by thy lying inventions : 
and they are lying inventions, as completely as it is a 
truth that He hath overcome thee, and hath com- 
manded us to be of good cheer.' 

" To such knowledge, I say, hath God called you in 
His mercy ; for this ye have His seal and writing,- — 
that is to say, the Gospel, baptism, and the sacrament, 
all which ye hear preached, so that ye will have no 
farther trouble nor danger. Only be of good cheer 
and return thanks with joy for such exceeding grace, 
for He who hath commenced it in you will bring it 
graciously to an end. For we cannot help ourselves 
in these matters ; we cannot prevail with our works 
against sin, death, and the devil; therefore another 
standeth in our place, who hath greater strength, and 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 345 

giveth us the victory, and coraraandeth us to accept it 
without doubt, and saith : 6 Be of good cheer, I have 
overcome the world ;' and again : 6 1 live, and ye also 
shall live, and your joy no man taketh from you' 
(John xvi. 22; xiv. 19). 

"The Father and God of all comfort grant you, 
through His holy "Word and Spirit, a firm, joyous, 
and thankful faith, that ye may happily overcome 
this and all other trouble, and that ye may taste and 
experience the truth of His words: 'Be of good cheer; 
I have overcome the world.' And I herewith com- 
mend you, body and soul, to his mercy. Amen. All 
your children pray for you, and also my Kate ; some 
of them are crying, others eating away, and saying : 
6 Grandmother is very ill.' God's mercy be with us 
all ! Amen. 

"Your loving son, 
"Martin Luther." 

We conclude these selections from Luther's letters 
with that charming composition which he addressed 
from Coburg to his little son Hans, in the simple 
poetry adapted to children (1530). 

" Grace and peace in Christ ! My dear little son, 
— I am glad to find that thou learnest well and pray- 
est diligently. Do this, my son, and continue it : 
when I return home, I will bring thee a fine fairing. 

" I know a beautiful cheerful garden, in which many 



346 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

children walk about. They have golden coats on, 
and gather beautiful apples under the trees, and pears, 
and cherries, and plums; they sing and jump about, 
and are merry ; they have also fine little horses with 
golden bridles and silver saddles. And I asked the 
man whose garden it is : ' Whose children are they V 
He replied : " These are the children who like to pray 
and learn, and are pious.' Then I said : c My good 
man, I have a son ; his name is Hans Luther : may he 
not also come to this garden, to eat such nice apples 
and pears, and ride such fine little horses, and play 
with these children?' And the man said: 'If he 
likes to pray and learn, and is pious, he shall come to 
this garden with Lippus and Just : and when they 
have all come together, they shall have pipes and 
cymbals, lutes, and other musical instruments, and 
dance, and shoot with little cross-bows.' 

" And he showed me a fine meadow in the garden 
prepared for dancing ; there hung nothing but golden 
pipes, cymbals, and beautiful silver cross-bows. But 
it was yet early, and the children had not dined. 
Therefore I could not wait for the dancing, and said 
to the man : 6 My good master, I will quickly go and 
write all this to my dear little son Hans, that he may 
pray diligently, learn well, and be pious, that he may 
also be admitted to this garden ; but he hath an Aunt 
Lena, whom he must bring with him.' The man 
answered : ' So be it ; go and write this to him.' 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 347 

" Therefore, my dear little son Hans, learn and 
pray with all confidence, and tell all this to Lippus 
and Just, that they also may learn and pray ; and ye 
will all meet in this beautiful garden. Herewith I 
commend thee to Almighty God. Give greetings to 
Aunt Lena, and also a kiss from me. Anno 1530. 

Thy loving father, 

Martin Luther." 

A man who, like Luther, united surpassing strength 
of character and intellect to deep expansive feeling 
and elevation of soul, was calculated to exercise an 
extraordinary power of attraction over all within his 
reach. We find, accordingly, a great number of 
revering friends unreservedly devoted to him, and 
who remained faithful to him to the end. The name 
of Philip Melanchthon occurs before all others to the 
mind, when Luther's friends are spoken of. The close 
connexion between these two men for the attainment 
of one great object, and the mutual balancing of the 
excellences of each, has indeed become almost prover- 
bial in Germany. Power and gentleness, courage and 
discretion, original thought and education, biblical and 
classical learning, formed in these two friends a 
brotherly union, which bore the happiest fruits, not 
only for the Reformation, but for the whole religious 
and scientific culture of evangelical Germany. In 
later years this relation between them did not, unfor- 



348 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

tunately, remain as pure as at an earlier period, when 
their intimate union was one of the most gratifying 
facts known in history. The harsh, domineering, and 
defiant features which were unmistakable in Luther's 
character, and which became more and more pointedly 
prominent in consequence of the divisions among the 
Protestant party, proved occasionally an insupportable 
burden to Melanchthon, — all the more insupportable 
because he bore it in silence. His whole nature, 
education, and convictions guided him with increasing 
decision to a mild, plastic, and comprehensive concep- 
tion on precisely those controverted points respecting 
which Luther gradually settled into an abrupt and 
exclusive dogmatism. Melanchthon laments this 
most bitterly soon after Luther's death, in a confi- 
dential letter, which is calculated to give the most 
painful impressions with regard to both the great 
men. But in the memory of the German nation, 
only the grand, fruitful, and brilliant aspect of this 
friendship continues to live unclouded ; while the 
humiliating shadows, the penalty paid by human 
weakness, are unnoticed except by truth-loving histo- 
rians and malicious opponents of the reformers. 

It is an inexpressibly soothing and affecting circum- 
stance in Luther's career, that he, the man of battle, 
of the most violent and important conflicts, left this 
earthly scene while engaged in a work of love and 
peace. Throughout life he had fought for the most 



REFORMATION IN 



GERMANY. 



349 



sacred spiritual possession of man : for the sake of 
peace to his more immediate country, he did not 
disdain to employ his last remaining strength in the 
settlement of a poor quarrel relating to worldly 
possessions. 

The reformer, whom Germany justly places in the 
van of her intellectual heroes, died (Feb. 18, 1546) at 
Eisleben, the city in which he first saw the light 
sixty-three years before. Two of the most important 
men of modern Germany, who in the last century 
shared the intellectual inheritance of Luther divided 
into opposite sections, coincide unintentionally in over- 
flowing admiration of his greatness. " I admire Luther 
to such a degree," writes Lessing, " that I am almost 
pleased to discover deficiencies in him; for I might 
else have been in danger of deifying him. The human 
deficiencies I discover in him are to me as valuable as 
the most dazzling of his excellences." And again, 
nearly a hundred years ago (1759) Hamann says: 
" What a disgrace it is to our time, that the spirit of 
this man, who has founded our church, should be thus 
covered with ashes ! What a power of eloquence ! 
what cleverness of exposition ! what a prophet !" 
And later (1780) "Are we not once more reduced to 
the point from which he started T 



350 



MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 



RETROSPECT AND CONCLUSION. 

If, at Luther's grave, we once more inquire for the 
result of the great religious epoch of which he was the 
spiritual head, a historical review will give us the 
following answer: In the middle of the sixteenth 
century a point of great importance was gained, — 
the power of Home was destroyed in a portion of the 
Christian world; and the foundation was laid of 
a more intellectual and pure church, much more 
nearly approaching the original spirit of Christianity. 
An extraordinary impulse was given to the develop- 
ment of the destinies of Europe, which resulted in 
the victorious rise and lasting ascendency of the 
German nations ; while in the south of Europe it en- 
gendered a religious and intellectual ferment, which, 
although violently suppressed, yet tended, in the 
countries subject to the Roman sway, to at least a 
partial purification of Catholicism. 

Opposed to these great and positive results of the 
Reformation, stand, however, undeniably the less 
gratifying facts, that many hopes awakened in the 
beginning of the great change have been disappointed. 
In fact, the religious problem was solved only by 
halves, the new order of things founded only elemen- 
tarily ; its principles secured by many struggles, it is 
true, but only partially carried out, and even the 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 351 

organisation of the new church arrested mid-course. 
Intimidated by the radicalism of the Anabaptists, and 
through the rebellion of the peasants; wearied and 
embittered by the dissensions between Luther and 
Zwingle ; urged on by the continued existence of a 
powerful Roman Catholic party, — German Protestan- 
tism was forced to take prematurely compass and 
substance, and in self-defence, as it were, to intrench 
itself within an incomplete form. Under other cir- 
cumstances, the great body of the German nation, 
united on the basis of the Gospel, would assuredly 
have completed the Reformation in a manner more 
satisfactory and comprehensive than the fragmentary 
condition in which it was left. Nor had the free and 
intimate union of the scientific with the religious 
spirit been lastingly attained, as hoped for in the first 
year of the movement. The beneficial effects of a 
liberal education had been again narrowed in many 
directions by the slavish and pedantic adherence to a 
few authors of Greek and Roman antiquity. The 
national literature had lost, in the strife of opinions, 
its free poetic spirit and its joyous inspiration. Of 
religious mysticism, which formerly warmed and 
nourished Luther and the Reformation, little more 
than a dull fanatical element remained, which finally 
exhausted itself in superstitious enthusiasm, — ecstasy, 
prophecy, anabaptism, and communism. But also a 
purer and deeper element of German mysticism was 



B52 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

left unsatisfied, nay felt itself repulsed, by the too- 
narrow theological and scholastic dogmatism of later 
Protestants ; and down to our times, this more imme- 
diate apprehension of Christianity has never ceased 
to assert its indestructible influence in different stages 
of development. The right of private judgment in 
interpreting the Scriptures, which promised so much, 
as established by Luther and his precursors, was less 
and less frequently exercised, in consequence of the 
dull and merely mechanical treatment of the articles 
of faith adopted by the church ; so that one of the 
highest and most important tasks of the Reformation, 
the creation of a real biblical system of theology, in the 
true comprehensive meaning of the word, was accom- 
plished and perfected in the last century only. 

Germany was also disappointed in the hope of 
political regeneration and national unity, as a conse- 
quence of religious enlightenment. It is true, her 
princes and representatives have had it attributed to 
them as an honour, that they did not consciously strive 
for this end; but if we carefully examine the con- 
nexign of German history down to the present time, 
''we shall recognise, even in this circumstance, only the 
miserable indecision which has so frequently been the 
bane of Germany. Had not the Protestant princes 
and cities already ventured upon resistance to the v 
emperor, and at length (in the war of Schmalcalden, 
1546-1547) upon open rebellion? Did they not 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 353 

cause a division of the empire into two separate 
masses, by which means the political hegemony of a 
Catholic or Protestant state must have become, sooner 
or later, inevitable in Germany? Did not the con- 
stant fear of the emperor's intentions ; the great, al-' 
though temporary, importance of Gustavus Adolphus ; 
the misery of the Thirty Years' War ; and, finally, 
the gradual growing up, under much trouble and with 
changing fortunes, of a Protestant power in the 
north of Germany, stand in the closest connexion 
therewith ? 

If we estimate all according to the full weight of 
its immeasurable consequences, we shall have to ac- 
knowledge to ourselves, that had the princes and the 
league of Schmalcalden realised their position and 
its consequences without any illusion ; had they com- 
prehended that then the possibility of a conservative 
reform and union of Germany, in the spirit of vic- 
torious evangelical Protestantism, was in question ; — 
they might, assembled around a Protestant emperor 
and a real reformed German diet, have entered upon 
the course which, much later, conducted the British 
empire to a sound political condition and to national 
greatness. But this was not to be. And it is the 
duty of the historian, not to put his own construction 
upon the past, but to seek to decipher the hand- 
writing of Providence. 

Let us rather complete our retrospection with 
23 



354 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

cheering and hopeful words. Much may have been 
unattained; still, the memorable intellectual advance 
gained in the period of the Reformation contained the 
germ of life, the development of which threw open to 
the German mind a free career of civilization, and 
awakened the deepest religious feeling. Both must 
lead to a great end, — to the true satisfaction and re- 
conciliation of the moral and intellectual wants of 
human nature, by means of an understanding and a 
realization of Christian truth, — if German Protestant- 
ism is not to be brought to a disgraceful end by inac- 
tion and schism. 

It was the object of this work to bring before the 
reader the hero of a period of German history, which, 
through the greatness of its events, and the immea- 
surable significance of its consequences, stands out 
from all that had gone before and has happened since. 
At the beginning of these thirty years (1517), a 
German monk stands at the church-door of Witten- 
berg, his finger raised in warning, and uttering words 
as bold as humble. At the close of the same period 
(1547), there stands a contemplative prince, whom 
half the world obeys, at the grave of the same monk, 
in the same church at Wittenberg, — victorious from 
the battle-field, yet perhaps conscious that a greater 
conqueror than he sleeps below. 

Between these two memorable days lie the great 
actions of a man who first reformed Germany, and 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 



355 



through Germany the world; a man who, we may 
say, fashioned the beginning of a new epoch of Chris- 
tianity and history, because by his agency the in- 
ternal and the external world, the Christian and the 
political spirit, were once again fused in the perfect 
manner which, on other occasions, it needed centuries 
to bring about. 

In the ages before Luther, only the conversion to 
Christianity of the Germanic peoples, and the struggle 
between the emperors and the popes, can be compared 
in spiritual importance with this interval In modern 
times, we can only place beside it, loosely speaking, 
the extraordinary intellectual and political changes 
which begun with Frederick the Great and the 
French Eevolution, the continuous effects of which 
are still felt on all sides. 

In the first place, a merely unprejudiced common 
human appreciation will suffice to discern in Luther 
one of the most prominent characters in history ; the 
eternal harmonies of the human soul found a pure 
and perfect echo in his heart. In the same manner, 
the age in which he lived was one of those historical 
turning-points which attract attention, again and 
again, by the grandeur of their events, and the im- 
portance of their consequences. 

Besides this universal aspect, we must view him 
from a national point of view. Luther is, more than 
any other, the man of the German nation. In his 



356 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

excellences as in his defects, in his grand qualities as 
well as in his objectionable peculiarities, are reflected 
the inherent characteristics of the German people; 
and he may probably be considered as much the rep- 
resentative as the creator of the intellectual and 
moral peculiarities of our nation. His strong faith, 
his tenderness and depth of feeling, his great command 
of popular language, his fondness of home, his enthu- 
siastic love of poetry, music, and nature, — all exhibit 
at once, in ideal embodiment, the true nature of the 
German character. Luther is, therefore, the property 
of his nation; no other reformer has so thoroughly 
identified himself with the mind of the people. 

If we recall, among other great names in German 
history, the reformers Melanchthon and Zwingle, the 
Saxon electors Frederick the Wise and John the 
Constant, Gustavus Adolphus and Frederick the 
Great; or among intellectual celebrities, Klopstock 
and Lessing, Hamann and Herder, Gothe and Schiller; 
or turn to the great religious reformers of the last 
century, Spener, Franke, Zinzendorf, Benzel, and 
Lavater ; — they all exhibit many features of relation- 
ship with Luther, and in some qualities may even 
surpass him, but not one stands out a Luther. One is 
deficient in the poetic impulse, in the fulness and ver- 
satility of his nature ; another wants his depth of 
religious feeling, his firmness of purpose and strength 
of character; others, again, want his eloquence or 



REFORMATION IN 



GERMANY. 



357 



influence over his contemporaries. Luther would not 
have been Luther without these three leading 
features, — his strong faith, his spiritual eloquence, and 
firmness of character and purpose. He united — and 
this is the most extraordinary fact connected with 
him — to large endowments of mind and heart, and 
the great gift of imparting these intellectual treasures, 
the invincible power of original and creative thought 
both in resisting and influencing the outer world. 

In conclusion : besides the common human and the 
national point of view, we must very specially con- 
sider Luther and his time in a religious aspect. We 
deem a true apprehension of Protestantism, and also 
of our time (which is greatly determined by it), 
utterly impossible without a thorough knowledge of 
the man and of the time in which Protestantism origi- 
nated : we must go back to the source, if we would 
look down the very channel of the stream which flows 
from thence. What Protestantism was originally and 
was meant to be, we can only learn there; what it 
became afterwards, the history of modern times must 
point out and determine. 

Most persons, when they mention Luther, think of 
him first in his religious importance; and this is 
certainly incalculable. He was the providential 
organ of a new epoch in the material (irdiscken) re- 
alisation of Christianity. In him the reformatory 
powers (as a regeneration of the Christian world in 



S58 MARTIN LUTHER, AND THE 

knowledge and life) first asserted irresistibly their 
influence over the fate of Europe and over the entire 
course of history. As the founder of a new religious 
community, as the spiritual head of a particular party 
(Confession), Luther is not seen in his highest abiding 
importance : he is rather the founder of the Christian 
church in all her sects (Confessionen) , than the mere 
founder of Lutheranism. It is a providential feature 
in his course, that he never lost the conviction that, 
standing on the ground of the universal Christian 
church, he was not breaking the thread of organic and 
historical development, but was rather taking it up 
again by re-opening the living but blocked-up sources 
of the religion of Christ. 

When he sought to restore her noble and original 
form from hierarchical and rationalistic deformity and 
perversion, he laboured in the common cause of all 
sects and parties of Christianity, — in the service of 
all who did not give up the hope that truth alone can 
make us free, — that only the heavenly mind of the 
Crucified One can permanently unite us; while human 
divisions, all the arbitrary creations of pride and 
egotism, must perish in the flames of divine justice, 
which the blind only do not see. 

Luther was able to exercise this extraordinary 
influence upon the religious world, because he had 
been prepared for it by the ardent travail of his own 
soul ; because, in a word, the history of his own spi- 



REFORMATION IN GERMANY. 359 

ritual career represented the conquest of spiritual 
(Pauline) Christianity over mere formal ordinances 
(Judaism). The gradual process by which he attained 
spiritual liberty became, therefore, for innumerable 
souls, the type of their own religious experience ; for 
through him they hrst became acquainted, in the 
significant antecedents of his development, with the 
pangs of the new birth, and the progressive unfolding 
of free Christian consciousness. 

We have endeavoured to represent Luther by 
briefly combining those particulars which must give 
him an imperishable significance and immortalise 
him ; — a labour ever necessary, and ever bringing its 
own reward, however frequently and efficiently it 
may have been previously executed. The German 
Evangelical Church will always look back most 
fondly, from every change in its temporal condition, 
and from every stage of its spiritual development, to 
its first and greatest Leader. 

At the present time there is ample reason to throw 
ourselves again into the midst of that great epoch, 
in order to attain, by the side of one of the most 
profound and powerful individuals of all time, a 
fitting elevation of thought, from whence we may 
view, with more ease and composure, the desolate 
steppes and the green pastures of the present. For 
in this one point at least, our times are brought into 



360 REFORMATION IN 

immediate contact with Luther's : then, as now, the 
highest social and religious questions were brought 
forward for solution; then, as now, the most sacred 
rights of individuals and of nations were contended 
for ; and in the sixteenth as in the nineteenth cen- 
tury, the die was cast on which the future depended. 

It may, therefore, seem a word in season, if, amidst 
the ferment of the antagonisms of the present cen- 
tury, we say, to those particularly who deeply feel the 
need of stemming the torrent by the force of clear 
commanding thought and firm conviction : Does not 
every serious mind endeavour, when the present is 
insecure and the future appears overclouded, to find 
the necessary light in quiet introspection and in 
looking back upon its previous life ? Why should not 
we from the same source derive light to solve the 
civil and religious problems of the times, and direct 
the future course of Our church and people ? 



GERMANY. 



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